Domenico Scarlatti

Embrace the spirit of spanish guitar on the forte piano!



Frédéric Chopin, as a piano teacher, notably wrote:
"Those of my dear colleagues who teach the piano are unhappy that I make my own pupils work on Scarlatti. But I am surprised that they are so blinkered. His music contains finger-exercises aplenty and more than a touch of the most elevated spirituality. Sometimes he is even a match for Mozart. If I were not afraid of incurring the disapprobation of numerous fools, I would play Scarlatti at my concerts. I maintain that the day will come when Scarlatti's music will often be played at concerts and that audiences will appreciate and enjoy it".

Quoted in the liner notes to Domenico Scarlatti, Sonatas, Anne Queffélec (piano). Apex CD 0927 44353 2 (2002).

Scarlatti is contemporary of Bach and Handel. He was born in Naples, Kingdom of Naples in 1685. Although he was born in Italy, he spent most of his lifetime under the service of Portuguese and Spanish royal families.

In his lifetime, he composed 555 keyboard sonatas. They are in single movement and mostly in binary form. Most of the sonatas are written for harpsichords and earliest pianofortes. (4 of them are for organ and some for group ensembles) As he spent most of his life time working for Portugese and Spanish royal families, his compositions display Iberian influence (Spanish and Portugese folk songs). At that time it was considered unconventional to have modulations to "exotic" keys and daring use of discords.

Source: wikipedia

Obviously if you listen to a lot of spanish music you will find that the Iberian flavor in Scarlatti's works comes from the guitar. Just like Chopin, I found that spanish guitar is very uplifting. A "sad" or "depressed" chord sounds so uplifting because of the "flamenco rhythm".

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Prokofiev

Anyone who loves prokofiev would have a slight kinkiness in their personality. Why? Listen to his music, you will not be more agreeable on this. There are many ways a composer can affect how a world think. Definitely, what Prokofiev has done to us all musicians and non-musicians is, music is not art that only please, it should muse you. Whichever way it is, he tells us that he could muse us with his arrangement of dissonances. And he really does.

Usually when you think that his music is a chaos, it is in its most orderly form possible. He is not just making noise. He made noises that quite resemble certain moments in your life. I think it is quite quirky type of art form and it is really quite intimate and fun to listen to.

Nowadays, many virtuoso pianists choose to perform his compositions in order to improve their pianistic skills or show off their athletic sides at piano bench. His piano concertos no.1-5 are meant to be admired like a modern piece of art. Unlike the background music that pleases everyone in restaurant you can find mysterious, lyrical, spiritual, elegant, artful, intense dynamic and dangerous moments in Prokofiev’s fine compositions. Pianists are able to play with tone colors in Debussy’s compositions, so as Prokofiev’s.

Some recommendations of recordings that are worth listening to:
Piano Concert No1 & 3 by Martha Argerich
Piano Concert No.2 by Yundi Li

Martha Argerich’s temperament suits Concert No.3 the most because she has the fiery element that helps to bring out the dynamic part of the third movement of that concerto. Listening to her third movement, you can feel that the sophistication of the pianist and the composer.

Yundi Li is a poetic pianist. More towards Chopin-Schubert type of spectrum. He is really good with the first movement. His interpretation creates a different dimension in the listening experience. His clean, transparent sound at the beginning helps to build the tension effectively towards the climax part of the piece. My favorites are first movement and the fourth movement.

In general, Prokofiev’s pieces are introduced to pianist in advanced level because they are very useful in learning intense wide jump, complex rhythm, strange intervals use, and wide range use of piano keyboard. Always, as a result, a pianist acquires a descent sight-reading skills from playing his pieces too.

The Big Daddy's Music

Bach is the father of western classical music. More specifically, he is the father of harmony. Because western music is the play of harmony language.

Many advanced and extroverted pianists get easily bored by Bach's steady music. But I enjoy his music the most. The orderly, the sense of balance and the integerity in his music is something I seek all the time. It is spiritual. It enhances one's intuitive perception. It is like a spiritual cleansing process while listening to his compositions. That never go out of style and that never bore me. It is something that I need, like food. It makes me think calmer and clearer.

My favorites are his Goldberg Variations, French Suite No. 2, French Overture and Partita No. 2. There are several recordings of his music by different pianists out there. I have some personal preferences to recommend.


Best Goldberg Variations would be the one by Canadian pianist Glenn Gould. He recorded a legendary Goldberg Variations. But if you want to listen to someone who is still alive, I would recommend Murray Perahia's. Murray Perahia is a musically mature pianist who is good at performing Mozart, Chopin's etudes and now Bach.

French Suite No. 2 by Andras Schiffs is worth listening to . First movement is the one that I usually listen to before going to sleep.

There is one young pianist I recommend to include in your list when you want to listen to Bach's French Overture- Joyce Yang. She was not even 19 years old when she performed this live in Van Cliburn competition. But I felt in love with the music right after I heard she performed it. Maybe she was nervous to hell when she started her repertoire marathon with this Overture but I felt she played it like the music has grown inside her - natural!

For Partita No. 2, I recommend 2 versions of it. First one is the recording of Martha Argerich's live performance. It is amazing! It makes my blood running. The second one is more solitude, by Andras Schiffs.

Bach music has a kind of optimistism accompanying his pompous steady beat. When I feel low or gray, his music restores my optimistism and uplift my spirit. It is indeed a gift from god (or anything above this dirty air). So, let's revive and cherish Bach's music to clean up the depression air.

Franz Schubert

Franz Schubert- whenever we think about his music, we think about lyricsm, flowing, melonchony quality of his compositions. Schubert was very good at word-painting his lyric with his music. For example, he can depict the spinning effect in one of his songs about spinning wheel with the piano accompaniment part.

Also good at improvising, he was greatly admired for his spontaneity in his music composition "on the spot". His beautiful impromptus were greatly admired. The style that he has is special in the alteration of the modes of music appropriately and artfully for the desired atmosphere that he wanted to create.

One good examples of his famous works includes his Impromptu Op 142 No. 3. It is in theme and variations structure. That is something that always lightens up my mood whenever I heard it.