Transcript Piano History- Classical Music and Concertos

Piano History
Classical Music Appreciation and the Concerto
TED TALKS
• Benjamin Zander: The transformative
power of classical music.
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9LC
wI5iErE
The Concerto
• From the Italian, meaning to play
together. Where we get the word
Concert.
• A Concerto is a piece of music
composed for any solo instrument,
accompanied by an orchestra (w/
strings) or wind band (w/o strings).
• Concerti (pl) are usually composed in
three movements.
Cadenza
• Cadence comes from the Italian word
cadence (or end of a section, like a
period)
• A cadence is a naturally falling
progression of chords which usually
ends at the I or V chord.
• Each Movement of a concerto ends
ends in a cadence.
• Often the solo performer would go off
on a flight of fancy, improvising a long
stream of notes and rhythms settling in
the final progression.
• These cadenzas were not usually
written in the music by the composer/
performer but were only put to paper
later.
Cadenza example
• Mozart Piano Concerto No. 17 in G
Major
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRE
krrO6Sto
Baroque/ Classical Era
c. 1600 - c. 1730
= orchestra
Keyboard
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Audience
The keyboard instrument was usually played by the
conductor (often the composer) who had his back to the
audience.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFfUcQQbwsE
Romantic Era
c. 1830 - 1900
• Franz Liszt changes the
arrangement of solo and
concerto performances
for piano.
• He turns the piano in
profile so the audience
may see his profile.
• Liszt was classical
musics Elvis
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Ludwig von
Beethoven
No. 5 in E-flat Major
Premiered in November 1811, in Leipzig, Germany.
A few months later, it was premiered in Vienna by Carl Czerny, one of
Beethoven’s students and future teacher of Franz Liszt, at the age of
12.
Known as the “Emperor” Concerto. One story of the name is that a
french officer at the Vienna premier stood up and exclaimed “C’est
l’empereur de concerti!” or “This is the Emperor of all Concerti!”
This piece is unique in the fact that it opens with the solo piano, where
most concerti open with the orchestra.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj9bXn4jr6M
Peter Ilyich
Tchaikovsky
• No. 1 in B-flat minor, Mvt 1
• Tchaikovsky was a piano player but was
a much better composer (nutcracker,
sleeping beauty). He wrote this piece
with his friend Nikolai Rubinstein in
mind to perform it.
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=
player_embedded&v=RG83EmwJpo8
Sergei Rachmaninoff
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Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor
Completed in 1909
Dedicated to pianist Josef Hoffman, who never performed the piece
himself stating that it was “not for him”
Premiered on November 28, 1909, in NYC by Rachmaninoff himself.
Performed as the final piece in the 2001 Van Cliburn Competition by
Russian Pianist Olga Kern.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AapjpeqmviM
20th Century
Jazz Concerto
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Commissioned in 1925 by conductor Walter Damrosch
Damrosch had been in the audience at the premier of Rhapsody in
Blue
Work premiered at Carnegie Hall in December 1925
Reviews were mixed, Russian composers Igor Stravinsky and Sergei
Prokofiev disagreed on the work. Stravinsky thought it was genius
and Prokofiev is said to have disliked it intensely.
George Gershwin Piano Concerto in F Mvt 3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DxUHcXUJZgY