I feel so frustrated every time I practice a new piece by Bach
How do you decide which notes to be played more staccato and which notes to be played more detached, or even legato?
I always have the thought that Bach should be played staccato. Am I wrong? But in WTC, most of the time you need to hold one note while playing 16th notes. That's most my frustration and confusion come.
Does it have like a general rule of thumbs to play Bach? I think this is what other pianist called touching? Or articulation?
btw I am learning BWV 862.
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This is such a great topic. I just started to learn my first piece from WTC, G major BWV884. I am having such a hard time learning it. My progress is painfully slow. I am not even at the stage of working on articulation yet. Thank you for sharing all the tips and insight. I will for sure check out the other Bach thread. I wonder if there is any practical advises on practicing the WTC for someone just starting. I tried working on small section (1-2 bars at a time). What is the best edition for fingering? I keep changing my mind because I can't decide what is the easiest for me.
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Peter Golemme When listening to modern pianists playing music from the Baroque and/or Classic and/or Romantic period, I conlude that speed is nowadays the most cherished part of virtuosity. The Concert hall became a Circus, and the Pianist is the Aerial Artist.
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Peter Golemme Maybe this one
https://archive.org/details/BACHCarlPhilippeEmanuel.EssayOnTheTrueArtOfPlayingKeyboardInstruments
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Gail Starr Peter Golemme thanks, Gail and Peter, for remembering my post on Tonebase Bach Stage! I found the entire post but couldn't link it here, so here's the Iink to the video directly:
https://youtu.be/ccNI8vmdDwQ?feature=shared
rebecca LAM you picked a very pretty Prelude and Fugue, I loved learning and playing this one very very much!
Do reach out if you would like to discuss anything, I'm always happy to share my (limited) experience
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Natalie Peh Thanks for sharing. Beautifully played!!! The prelude is very musical, and the sound is very clear. I will for sure reach out to you.
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Natalie Peh Thanks for sharing the link Natalie, it was nice to revisit your performance, especially in the context of this discussion.
P.S. Gail Gail Starr says you practice 25 hours a day. Do you also practice 8 days a week? It shows!
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Michael Walther Thank you Michael. I was unaware of this archive service. They won't let me borrow it but at least I can read it there. I'm still bewildered as to why this is not currently in print.
What a great contribution to civilzation this Archive is. Hopefully it will survive the sacking of our culture and society that is presently occurring...
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Peter Golemme Have You considered to load it down?
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Peter Golemme lol, that's a myth, though I would dearly love to have that much practice time!
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Peter Golemme Natalie lives in Malaysia, so I'm pretty sure they benefit from at least one extra hour per day over there...because ANY time on log into Tonic, Natalie is practicing.
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Peter Golemme Hi Peter. My son has a copy of the CPE Bach treatise. I got it used several years ago off of Thrift Books. Here is a link to some used copies. E-bay is also an option!
And when my teacher and I have discussed articulation in Bach (and others), he has read to me from some more recent book which quotes CPE Bach (among others) - if I can find the name of that book, I'll let you know.
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Michael Walther Hi Michael, I didn't realize that was an option, thank you! I'll visit the site tonight and see whether it's a possibility in this case. Thanks again.
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Gail Starr Hmmmm, I see. So that also puts Natalie Peh near the International Date Line, which must be how she gets in that 8th day every week!
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Michelle R Thanks very much Michelle, those are great leads also. I'd be very happy with a used copy. I did a little reading through the treatise directly on the Archive site, and found so much more in there than I even realized. (I was originally interested in what he had to say about ornamentation and how to get in and out of one key from another.)
I'm also etremely interested to hear that you're studying Baroque improvisation and counterpoint. It's something I'm trying to learn myself and infuse into my jazz/pop song improvisations. There are a couple of really excellent Tonebase seminars on Baroque improvisation and partimento by Derek Remesc and Jon Smolinski (sp?) & possibly others. I got a copy of Dr. Remesc's "Compendium of Voice Leading Patterns" and the Kellner Treatise on thoroughbass off of his Website and am working my way through them. LOTS of great material for the improviser and anyone interested in Baroque music.
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Peter Golemme Yes, it's been fun (though very slow here at the beginning) to start learning counterpoint - which will lead to improvisation. My teacher is Johnandrew Slominski - he does have some videos on Tonebase and he's relatively close to us geographically. We are in a remote and isolated area, so Zoom lessons have been a blessing for us. I found him while looking for a new teacher for my son. He and some colleagues from Eastman started a program some years ago called "Classical Music on the Spot" to help classically-trained musicians begin delving into the world of improvisation. His knowledge is quite vast, and we've done many things I'd never considered would be part of piano lessons.
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Peter Golemme precisely!
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Peter Golemme I'd like to point to three excellent books.
Harmony, Counterpoint, Partimento by Job Ijzerman and
Music in the Galant Style by Robert Gjerdingen.
And naturally the bible:
Georgio Sanguinetti: The Art of Partimento
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Michael Walther Dear Michael, thank you for sharing your extensive knowledge of these resources. You must be a serious student of the Baroque! I'm not familiar with any of these, but it sounds like they deal with exactly what I am trying to learn more about at this moment, and I will definitely check them out! thanks again.
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Michelle R Thank you for sharing this Michelle. Yes Mr. Slominski was the person I was trying to recommend in my post above! what a treasure for you to be able to study directly with him. I'd be very interested in hearing your efforts & progress with Cantus Firmus and counterpoint. If you or Thurmond make any recordings of your efforts or progress in this regard, I hope you'll share them (Or even if they are just experiments which you don't think are ready to post publicly, feel free to send me a private youtube link.) Good luck with your practicing and development of these skills!
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Peter Golemme I'll start posting some of my attempts on writing counterpoint (currently only first species) against a Cantus Firmus - I posted a video today on my Practice Diary (https://piano-community.tonebase.co/t/h7h7r8n/michelles-diary-of-a-beginning-pianist) . Thurmond is actively improvising, currently with La Folia (I can't remember which one they are using) as a start and doing variations on it. With his composition teacher he's composing a canon at the fifth. We can record some of his work, too. His is much more impressive and fun to listen to than mine!
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Hey everyone and thanks to Taylor Ma for starting this conversation!
I have a lot of thoughts on this - I will be scheduling a livestream to discuss this and ANY other questions you might have - easier than typing everything out + I can demonstrate :)
Stay tuned for this stream in the upcoming weeks. I will be collecting questions here, so if you have other questions and any specific ones, don’t be shy!-
Dominic Cheli Im currently breaking my neck, practicing J. S. Bachs' Preludium # 2 WTC Book 1.
What kind of attack is appropriate. Staccato is to harsh and tends to sound mechanical.
In addition what kind of Dynamics is appropriate.
Same question applies naturally to Preludium # 1 WTC Book 1, and other pieces of this figurative type.
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Dominic Cheli that's wonderful!! I can't wait to watch the livestream. I am working on WTC book 2 G major.
I have a general question about tempo. In the past, I tend to rush through a piece and try to play at a fast tempo before I am ready. I started practicing at a very slow tempo so I will get all the rhythm and note correctly. I watch your other livestream where you talk about practicing close to your goal tempo with very short section, like 1-2 bars at a time. When I try to do the fast tempo, that is when I realize some of the fingering would not work. Now I have to go back and re-learn the new fingering. And it sounds worse than before and I feel like I am not making much progress. I cannot even get through a few bars at a time.
Question: What practice tempo do you recommend in the early stage of learning a piece? Do you go back and forth with slow, moderate and fast every time you practice?
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Michael Walther Hey Michael, I'm working on the same piece (the C Minor Prelude WTC Bk1). I'd be happy to compare notes. I'm experimenting with playing it at a very moderate tempo (up until the Presto), and trying to accent and sustain the first notes of each figuration as a kind of melody on top of the figuration, which I'm trying to play more softly underneath. For this to work it's necessarily got to be legato. I agree, staccato doesn't work.
I hope when you are ready you'll post your version on our Bach thread. I plan to do the same, though it could be awhile before I do so. (and being "ready" doesn't necessariy mean "perfected'--it can be a great place to try something out and see what kinds of reactins you get).
I've got a version of the C Major Prelude & Fugue posted there already if you want to check it out. There are also many other wonderful postings there by Tonebase members of all levels .
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Peter Golemme
I have checked my five versions of Bach's Prelude #2 c-minor from WTC book 1.
Keith Jarrett 90 bpm
Andras Schiff 90 bpm
Rosalyn Turek 110 bpm
Angela Hewitt 120 bpm
Zhu Xiao-Mei 120 bpm
I find Jarrett and Schiff convincing, Rosalyn Turek, Angela Hewitt and Zhu Xiao-Mei not.
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Michael Walther hi Michael, thanks for this info. I’ve got a rather large collection of different pianists playing one or both volumes of the complete well temped Clavier (some might think TOO large a collection).
i’ll send you a similar list of some of the other pianists’ tempos for the C minorwhen I get a chance.
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