Measure 28 of Schumann's First Loss
Hi,
Music is in meter 2/4 In M 28, the left hand is holding EG for a full beat. Then how do we play the same E on right hand? both the left and right hand are on Treble cleff. If we lift the left hand from the E so the right hand can play that E, then doesn't that mean that the LH didn't hold the notes for the full beat? Is pedalling supposed to be used here?
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In general, it is not uncommon for this sort of thing to happen in piano music; the composer is showing how the music works in their head, but in practice pianos don't work that way, so you have to just restrike the E and in fact the first E only gets held for an eighth note.
Specifically for this piece, though, this notation is unusual. I just spot-checked three editions of op. 68 on IMSLP, including the first edition and Clara Schumann's edition, and they all have an eighth-note rest at the end of the bar in the left hand (the E-G dyad lasts only an eighth note). So that seems to make the issue moot in this particular case, but as I said above, you will run into it again in the future, so it's good to have been exposed to it now.
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Thank you Dan Schmidt !, now that you mentioned it, I looked at the IMSLP and there is a rest as you described. I have the Alfred book, introduction to Schumann's piano music which doesn't have the rest.
https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/en/product/schumann-an-introduction-to-his-piano-works-3503311.html -
Yeah the rest clarifies it a lot, if you do run into this situation again without the rest then it'd still just be re-playing the E possibly without removing the pedal so the first E is still held, but many times this kind of thing occurs when voices cross so it's more about differentiating the different E's being part of the different hand/voices and not part of the same line if that makes sense like in a fugue.
