Hi Andreas,

I'm delighted that you could hear improvement in my newer rendition of the sonata. And thank you too for those kind comments! It does feel like an achievement to me. It came with a price though. Because of its length and complexities, it took me longer (with my limited practice time) to learn this piece than is customary for me. I also found that Medtner can knock a piano out of tune just as easily as Scriabin. It took a lot of energy, but in the end was well worth it. I do need a "vacation" from Medtner for awhile. He and I are not quite on good terms yet, having battled to a truce. I'm open to looking for another piece or two of his to learn in the future, but with Medtner, it'll be a long search. Any piece of Bortkiewicz or Catoire I examined, well, it was love at first sight. Medtner is very different.

I've begun work on my next piece to record. It will be a trifle, but a most surprising one for the members here.

Thanks again, my good friend.

David

Rachfan wrote:


Well, I think, we all have composers, we feel a lot of affinity and such we feel less of it. You have mentioned from beginning, that the "germanic mind" of his music is not your first preference (to express it attentively). But nevertheless it seems to me you can express that kind of mind very well in your interpretation of the Medtner-sonata. I think, the steadiness and clearness in your elaboration is an element of that "germanic mind". (Saying that as a german, I have to add, that this is not meant as a self-praise, of course. )



I´m attending that piece with curiosity!

Hi Andreas,

I think back years ago to my playing of Bach, Beethoven, Schumann and Brahms. Very honestly, those composers were not my "forte". Bach has all those intricacies. To be honest, I played only enough to meet requirements when I was very young, and then abandoned Bach. Beethoven is very challenging--every one of his pieces is a superb teaching piece and holds lessons for even the most advanced pianists. I've only played a half-dozen or so of the the sonatas, and none from his late period. Brahms was always difficult for me, as he often thought orchestrally rather than pianistically (although as a younger man, he was a fine pianist). Brahms loved figuration which came out of the octave, making it much more awkward to play well. I've played about a half-dozen of his intermezzi and a couple of the rhapsodies and let it go at that. I probably fared best with Schumann, although I'm easily put off by his sometimes quirky rhythmic notation and his sometimes "thumpy" music, although I cannot lump all of his compositions into those categories, of course. I tended to select pieces from his lyrical side: I played an intermezzo, some of the Kinderscenen, the Arabesque, Blumenstuke, the first Novellette, and the second Romance (in the correct key of F#, not G). So yes, I put just a little scratch in the surface of the Germanic piano literature, but I simply don't believe I can play it nearly as well as music of France or Russia, or pianists who spend a great deal of time with Germanic music. So the problem is not the Germanic repertoire per se as much as my own difficulties in trying to master it. So I try to capitalize on my strengths by turning to other composers who music feels more natural for me. These days I certainly enjoy listening to and admiring others, like you, who play these very important composers so well. And I have a good appreciation for the hurdles they overcome to produce fine performances and recordings. Well, I guess it comes down to the old saying: "We cannot be great at everything!"

I'm grateful for your comment that in the Medtner sonata, I seem to get into the spirit of this music more than I suppose. That's reassuring. As I say, I'm keeping an open mind and will likely revisit Medtner in the future. Hopefully we can be more amicable at our next meeting.

I was able to practice the trifle today of the nearly forgotten composer. I think you and the others will enjoy hearing it, perhaps for the first time.

David

Hi David,

Thanks for sharing your recording, my first taste of Medtner! Fascinating stuff. You bring true passion and commitment to this very difficult music.

Forgive this very long post, but I couldn't stop thinking about one of the issues raised in this thread because it has such relevance to my own situation, though in a different way. It's the question of authenticity.

Others here have been saying that you're being unnecessarily hard on yourself when you record, because you won't allow yourself the advantages afforded by editing. And you've replied that editing would rob your music of its authenticity, since you would no longer be playing the piece in one take, as you would in a concert situation.

I'd like to suggest that there's another way of looking at the question of authenticity. And it has to do with being true to the composer's vision, as well as your own. Because that's what we're doing when we present a recording to the public, right? Offering, as accurately as we can, a record of what the composer intended, as it filters through our own artistry and personality.

And surely, neither Medtner nor you, would hear, as part of a vision for this piece, a brief audible struggle at page turns, or the sound of rustling paper! Not to mention some inaccuracies that could, with editing, be improved upon.

Plus, you might feel more relaxed if you didn't regard each run-through as all-or-nothing. And that can only improve your playing.

So is it possible that by adhering to one version of authenticity, you're actually ending up with a recording that's less authentic?

As to what this has to do with me: I've been recording on a digital instrument recently (after almost 60 years of playing nothing but acoustics). And part of me is struggling mightily with this, because I enjoy playing my acoustic more and have much better control on it.

But, for various reasons, I want and need to record my playing these days, and share those recordings with others. And, compared to what I end up with when I use my upright, my digital recordings seem to me to provide results that are truer to what I hear inside. (Better tone, quieter background, more precise dynamics (at times) thanks to easier editing.) In those very important ways, the recordings seem more authentic.

That word, again. And it surely sounds strange that I'm applying it to digital technology, as opposed to acoustic. But that's just my take on my situation, at this moment in time, given what I have to work with.

Anyway, I'm sure there are no easy answer to these questions. I hope what I've written has some meaning for you!

Hi Bruce,

I would fully agree with you that you have a point of view, but I'm not persuaded. Let me share more of my thoughts on this if I may.

Editing has been around for a very long time. Back in the days of piano rolls, the recording studios quickly figured out that if there were a wrong note on the roll, they could easily paper it over and make the hole in the exact place that would sound the correct key on the player piano. In the days of the 78 and 33 rpm recordings, the engineers had cutting machines used to excise the wrong notes in a part of a tape recording, and then spice the replacement piece of tape. In the digital era, the recording engineers' bags of tricks became far larger and much more facile with electronic wizardry like sampling. I'm reminded of the story of the well-known pianist who had a very difficult and frazzling recording session. At the end of the day the engineer said he'd work on the recording, and asked the artist to return in a few days. When he did return and listened to the recording, he was extolling its virtues, at which point the engineer said, "Don't you wish YOU could play like that?" I think this pursuit of perfection has gone too far--which is not a good thing in my opinion. Years ago when we heard a recording, we could often tell immediately who the pianist was. Nowadays, they all seem to sound alike. Young pianists who listen to CDs today actually believe that the perfection that they hear is real, when quite often the true maestro was the recording engineer. As a result they aim for cautious, note perfect renditions. At competitions they all play the same sanitized, plain vanilla, and boring renditions. They take few risks, there is no hint of individuality in their performances, and then we all wring our hands worrying that recital audiences are shrinking.

The fundamental, irreducible, unshakable and immutable fact of the human condition is that that we are not perfect. If we were perfect, then we would be gods. Horowitz used to say that if in just one moment in an artist's lifetime, he were to get even close to perfection, then that would be a very lucky person indeed! Horowitz felt that the very idea of the perfect performance would be an imperfection. And yet we're inundated with "perfect recordings" on CDs. The reality is that we do not live in a perfect world, and in my view edited recordings present an illusion. That is, they pose as perfection, denying the existential imperfection. Authenticity, I suppose, might be in the eye of the beholder. What if one takes six recordings, uses one cut from No. 1 for the introduction; passages from No 2. for part of the exposition; a cadenza from No. 3; a snippet from from No. 4 to fix some wrong notes; No. 5 for some fluffs in the recapitulation; and half the entire coda taken from recording No. 6. Is that an authentic performance? Is there any assurance at all that the pianist can actually play the piece through reasonably well? Is the performance represented on that recording really authentic? Or what about the midi guru who painstakingly builds a complex piece note by note using sampling and sequencing, spends months fine tuning it, and passes his 100% editing job off as his "performance". Is that authentic? I wonder if Rachmaninoff would enjoy hearing his Etudes-Tableaux played robotically on midi? The question then is where does one draw the line? Is there universal agreement about the positioning of that line? Or is there no line at all? If it's left to "in good taste" then there is no line, and editing is open to abuses. There is a huge relativity there, which further puts me off from having any desire to edit my recordings.

Back in 1901 and before, there were no recordings, only live performances. But there were performance practices, well known virtuosos in those eras as today, and plenty of music critics. Artists made plenty of mistakes in their playing. Did those errors or memory lapses (e.g., Cortot, D'Albert, etc.) dishonor the composers? I recall hearing Artur Rubinstein at Symphony Hall in Boston in the 1960s. The hall was packed with extra stage seating for the conservatory students. Rubinstein was not known for accuracy, and he missed a leap in the left hand, and dropped a few notes under the piano. Did that destroy the composer's intent? Not according to the huge ovation Rubinstein drew from an appreciative audience! They were more taken with the scope of his interpretation, his magisterial approach, his playing in the grand manner, all of which was totally inspiring. When Richter's recording of "Pictures at an Exhibition" was released, klinkers and all, it caused a worldwide sensation. Did Richter's errors dishonor the intents of Mousorgsky? I doubt it given the general response! Nor do I think a few errors on the part of an amateur damages the composer's intent. We all want to serve the composer to the very best of our abilities, but we're not perfect. We're mere mortals, not gods.

When I have to do a recording, there are two microphones on stands pointing toward the piano and a recorder, which I must operate, to the left of my bench. Yet I never think of it as a recording session. To me it's a performance. I'm just an amateur pianist far removed from the realm of a Rubinstein, or Lorti, or Lugansky. Nonetheless, I look at a performance as a noble effort where the only concern is ars gratia artis. My concentration is focused on my interpretation--forming the imagery in my mind, feeling the emotion of it, forming musical intent, executing that intent to the best of my ability, playing with freedom and taking risks, and communicating my interpretation to the audience. And if there are two or three fluffs? Those can happen to anyone in performance. It's the existential reality.

As far as the composer's vision is concerned, a number of things come to mind. I can cover this ground though with two extremes. First, I think of Brahms. The reports of the time when he was getting elderly was that his playing of his own works was sloppy. Unlike when he was a younger man, he no longer put any time into practicing. So he was not achieving his own vision then? His response: "The audience already knows the notes." At the other end of the spectrum, oftentimes a pianist comes to know a work far better than the composer ever knew it. How can that be possible? Because whereas the composer finished the manuscript, sent it to his publisher, turned his attention to six other works in progress, and never found time to revisit that piece again, by contrast a pianist might spend years or a lifetime with that piece always gleaning new and deeper insights into the music. By then the pianist's vision has become as or more valid than the composer's, and is just as authentic in my opinion.

Page turns: I notice that Marc-Andre Hamelin often performs using scores, sometimes with a page turner, sometimes without one. In the latter case, as adept as he is, I wouldn't be surprised if the people in the first couple of rows could hear some paper rattle from that exercise now and then. But given his amazing playing, who would ever care? In my own case I can no longer memorize, have no page turner, so have to turn pages. Again, a Hamelin I'm not, so I do the best I can. I'm thinking that maybe I should abandon big pieces and concentrate on two-page miniatures. It would certainly solve the problem! On the other hand, we seem to forget that websites like PS mostly get home recordings, with a few live recital recordings at times. So in my mind a bit less formality is to be expected from home recordings.

The last thing I want to mention is that I notice here at PS there are two parallel tracks of critique. 1) The quality of the performance and 2) the quality of the editing. Examples: The cut is too noticeable, it needs some noise filtering, not enough reverb, etc. etc. It's as if editing has sometimes seemingly been elevated to an art form almost on par with performance itself. In my own humble opinion, I believe it receives more attention than it deserves relative to performance.

I guess I probably sound very old fashion and unyielding in my views on this matter. But I feel very strongly about it, and yes, I do believe that eschewing editing is the more authentic way of presenting a performance. That's just one man's opinion, of course. I've never had feedback that I've failed to serve a composer's intents well, so feel confident in continuing on course in producing good recordings of lesser known works without editing. For those who wish to edit, I say more power to them if they believe it's helpful to them. It's just not my thing.

Best,
David

Hi David,

Wow—what a beautiful reply. And honestly, there's not a single point in it I would want to argue.

For myself, what I'm doing now is simply an experiment—seeing how it feels to record music in a tightly controlled and edited manner. At this moment, it's teaching me a lot, and allowing me to create results that are pleasing to me for specific reasons. Tomorrow, the pendulum may well swing the other way!

I just put up a YouTube video yesterday in which I edited just one note, to make it last longer. And boy, was I glad not to have to trash that lovely, spontaneous take, AND not to have to suffer through hearing that one bothersome flaw on each listening. You may disagree, but that feels to me like a good use of editing.

Bruce

Hi David,

Difficult stuff. I admire anyone who takes on Medtner's piano music, what with its cerebral polyphonic motifs and complex polyrhythms (very Scriabinic in that aspect, it seems). Personally, I think it's great that you like to preserve the authenticity of your recordings by using a single continuous take. I don't want to postulate on whether inserting edited passages is unauthentic, primarily because I resort to it sometimes . But I like to use complete takes myself when I feel ok about them, it seeming much more spontaneous to do so.

Many passages in this you bring off with great bravura and poise. The difficulties are clearly within your grasp. I can't help thinking, though, that maybe this would come off better if it were memorized, though I do know how difficult that is with this late romantic Russian music. At times, the overall effect seems that the texture is a bit dense and dynamically opaque and the rhythm frazzled and unsteady. It's just that focusing on the page and not the feeling can make one a bit uptight, I know only too well -- and not to beat a dead horse, but the page turns are a bit distracting for this listener as well

For my taste, the ending surges come off best -- I think you capture the sweeping lyricism of this music well. Overall, despite my blunt two cents , a fine performance and a courageous endeavor to tackle this formidable work.

Joe

Hi Joe,

Thanks so much for your comments! I appreciate that.

The problem I have with memorizing now is just age related (happens to us all). I have enough trouble remembering what I had for lunch. So unfortunately, memorizing is no longer an option for me. Of course I agree with you, if one is not married to the score, it's easier to attend to the sweep of the music. A problem I have is not being a speed reader. That applies as equally to reading a music score as reading a book or the newspaper. I like to savor what I read rather than pushing through it quickly. So sometimes my hands get ahead of my eyes which once in awhile causes a fluff.

Yes! The thick textures in Medtner--and to manage them up to speed--are an ordeal to say the least. That's an aspect of this music where the virtuoso can show the amateur (like me) how it's done. For me it sometimes felt like wading through snow up to my hips. Not to mention voicing it all. Sometimes I elected not to voice, allowing some of Medtner's more daring harmonies to enter the foreground for a moment.

The romantic surges are the sine qua non of the late romantic repertoire. It's what I love most about it.

I'm delighted to hear that your aim too is usually the single take for a recording. There aren't many of us left.

Thanks again!

David

That´s right, of course. May be I´m not so good with the russian composers, though I don´t know. I also have played Scriabin (some of his etudes), Mussorgsky (the complete "Pictures at an exhibition) and Tschaikowsky, but until know I havn´t played any Bortkiewitz. May be the day will come I do it, being inspired by your wonderful interpretations. I think, at this moment we complement one another very well with our preferences.



Keeping an open mind counts also for me as I should come back one day to some russian composers. Playing the "Pictures at an exhibition" f.ex. was - or still is, because I play in my school sometimes one or the other piece of this cycle - always a great pleasure for me.



You make me more and more curious, must be something very seldom.

Hi Andreas,

I agree with your perspective here on repertoire. Anytime we leave our comfort zone and enter a musical territory is is more foreign to us and more difficult, it stretches our abilities which is beneficial to us as pianists.

Ah, the "mystery composer"! I'm going to keep him totally under wraps until the moment I actually post his piece. (And no advance hints either.)

Hi David, congrats on this new and very successful try. I would know how much you have to work to arrive at this level of accuracy in a such complex piece. Actually I liked your last version very much, though. I could feel a vast amount of energy and passion there. In this version you seem to speak your musical language more fluently and more convinced. This improved facility took me of that impression a bit??? Well, I listend to your old one a while ago and the impression may be involved not only with your interpretation but also with this great work itself, cause it was my first exposure to this piece. Anyway, I owe this great experience to you!

Hi Hye-Jin,

Thanks so much for listening to the newer recording. You're one of a very few who have commented on it. This is my first experience here re-posting the same piece, so what I learned from the experience is that most people listen to the original and let it go at that. So I'm grateful you made the effort to listen to the new one. I'm delighted that you found this rendition more fluent and were more convinced by it. I tried to carry that same passion from the original over into this performance, and believe I succeeded in that aspect. I did attend also to Chris' errata list, and believe I corrected or improved most of them, although I never heard back from him. So at least it's more accurate than before. (Not that I'm planning a third recording! ) Anyway when I finished up with this recording, Medtner and I were still on speaking terms... sort of. So maybe someday I'll attempt another work of his.

Thanks again for listening and you nice comments.

David

Though I know Medtner and have heard some of his music, I must confesss this piece was to me unknown, so perhaps I am not the right one to comment on the musical side. I can, however, say I noticed a marked improvement between versions 1 and 2.

I agree with Rachfan about recordings and editing. Having listened mostly to recordings and less to the real thing. Why this? Where I grew up concerts were not all that common or at least concerts limited themselves to the same Chopin preludes and Liszt etudes, so only though recordings could one become acquained with a wide array of composers. The downside is that I always heard what seemed noteperfect performances, leading me to believe concert pianist simply did not make mistakes. Mistakes I made aplenty, but then, what could I expect, being an rank amateur! Only now do I realise this actually undermined any hopes I had of making it good as a pianist. Even though I know this to be false and that perfect recordings are down to perfect engineering, I struggle to make any recordings. I play somethimg, realise I can play it quite well, sometimes even note perfect. Then I Say, "Record!" And there it goes all wrong: I grow so anxious not to make a single error that I find myself anticipating the mistakes I make a moment later.

I have something to learn from Rachfan.

Hi Richard,

Thanks so much for taking time to listen to the re-recording of this sonata. I'm glad that you could discern the progress made since the original effort. My problem has always been that if I fix one error, another crops up elsewhere that previously had never been a problem! Given its difficulty, I believe this is one of those pieces that could be studied for a very long time if not a lifetime.

I'm glad too you agree on doing authentic rather than edited recordings. Editing has always existed beginning with piano rolls, of course, but seems to have intensified with the dawn of hi-fidelity, stereo sound and on up through the present day. It seemed that to match the wonderful realistic sound quality that became available (a mere technical achievement), then performing too had to become "perfect", even though there is no perfection in life and art. So once again technical wizardry became elevated to an art form of recording engineers. Most consumers of records and CDs actually believed what they were hearing in these commercially edited recordings. So to competitively sell product, all of it had to be made perfect. Worse yet the wizardry began to make all pianists sound alike too. I guess it has been in some ways a benefit, but in other ways a curse. For awhile one could escape this artificiality by purchasing "live performance" CDs instead of studio recordings. But alas, by the 1980s the recording engineers boldly decided to alter live recital recordings too as if revising history. Thus, what we hear on Horowitz's Moscow Recital, for example, is not what the audience heard in the moment. Then came the affordable or free edit-it-yourself-at-home type software like Audacity which brought the amateurs into the editing world as well.

As an amateur, if in doing a good recording take there are a few slips or a homey page turn that contradicts the illusion of perfection, well, then I accept that as a badge of courage for undertaking a larger, difficult work and sharing it as a real single-take performance. My sense is that if someone wants the note-perfect and "musically enhanced" version, then they can turn to the professional CDs of Lortie, Katsaris, Volodos, Hamelin, Lugansky and the other virtuosi who not only play with big techniques, but have highly talented recording engineers as well to clean up any issues. I make no pretense of being able to play as well as they can or to even come close. There are many other amateur pianists here at PS whom I greatly respect and who choose to edit their recordings. I have no dispute with that at all. It's just that I prefer not to edit my own recordings. I just want them to be what they are--my best efforts to interpret, perform and record great music.

Again, thanks for listening, and I enjoyed reading your thoughts on recording.

David

As always, David heads the no-edit lobby with great flair .

There seems to be one flaw in the logic though. I see the point of not wanting to correct any minor slips, but why on earth would cutting out a page turn in any way compromise the spontaneity and artistic quality of a recording ? A noisy and rhythm-disrupting page turn is about as homey as a boil on the tip of one's nose, and equally nasty to behold. I would personally take that little effort to remove it, and spare the listener this irritating moment that spoils the musicality of the performance more than a shower of slips will do, and will grate on repeated listening.

An alternative to a difficult page turn could be to plan it better, by memorizing a couple of bars before or after it. Often there is a suitable place nearby where the page turn can be done discreetly, maybe facilitated by letting one hand help another for a moment. With some careful consideration, many page turns are manageable. But under no circumstances they should be heard to disrupt the flow.

Just my opinionated two cents of course.