Advanced Literature

Michaela Boros

The A-B-C’s of Nocturne Repertoire: Alexander Before Chopin

Piano students transitioning from method books to standard intermediate repertoire often yearn to study the beautiful and deservedly popular Chopin Nocturnes. However, these require oft-underestimated musical sensitivity and technical command. Jane Magrath recognizes this in The Pianist's Guide to Standard Teaching and Performing Literature, statin...
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Sean Schulze

Steps to Parnassvs: Preparing Students to Play Advanced Masterworks

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All learning of complex knowledge and sophisticated skills must be approached by first learning more limited and simplified versions of what students are eventually needing to master. The nature of the simplifications—the substance and magnitude of each task, the sequence in which the tasks are presented, the speed of ...
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SeanSchulze Advanced Literature Advanced Artistry
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Sandra Soderlund

Franz Liszt the Teacher

Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt was a legendary pianist, famous for his overwhelming technical prowess and expressive power. Many today do not realize that as a teacher he had a lasting effect upon piano playing throughout Europe and even in the United States. Most of the great pianists of the nineteenth century came under his influence, whether or not they attended h...
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SandraSoderlund Repertoire & Performance Artistry Advanced Literature
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Michael Maxwell

The completion of De Profundis: Instrumental Psalm for Piano & Orchestra by Franz Liszt

Excerpt 1: Liszt’s dedication page. “De Profundis Psaume Instrumental pour Orchestre et Piano Principal by F. Liszt.” Dedicated to the Abbé Felicité de Lamennais.
The instrumental psalm De Profundis for piano & orchestra by Franz Liszt (Raabe: 668, Searle: 691) is an unfinished, though virtually complete manuscript held by the Goethe and Schiller Archive in Weimar, Germany. It was composed during the late summer of 1834 while Liszt was staying at La Chênaie, in Brittany, having sought out the company of ...
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MichaelMaxwell Repertoire & Performance Artistry Advanced Literature
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Duncan Cumming

Frank Glazer

Frank Glazer in 1936. Photograph by Ben Pinchot.
Many people have played all thirty-two Beethoven Sonatas in one concert season before, but I would be willing to bet that no one has done it for the first time at age ninety-five. Frank Glazer holds a unique place among concert pianists and teachers. He is the last living student from the Berlin days of the great Beethoven interpreter Artur Schnabe...
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DuncanCumming Repertoire & Performance Advanced Literature Interview
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Michelle Do

The life of Chopin (and autographed piano)

The Chopin Foundation of the United States has in its possession a rare and unique item: a Pleyel piano with the autograph of Frederic Chopin. This well-traveled piano has touched many lives and resided in multiple countries, not unlike the man who signed it. As we celebrate the 200th birthday of this influential composer, it is notable to con...
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MichelleDo Chopin Repertoire Advanced Literature
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Allison Nelson

The Pedal Piano and the Schumanns

In 1845, Robert Schumann wrote what are undoubtedly some of the most beautiful and enduring pieces of music for the pedal piano, his Six Etudes in Canon Form, Op. 56; Four Sketches, Op. 58; and Six Fugues on the Name B-A-C-H, Op. 60 (for organ or pedal piano). Schumann was an enthusiastic student of counterpoint, and his interest in the pedal piano...
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Jim Samson

Which Chopin?

There have been numerous collected editions of Chopin's music since his death, and few of them agree on anything. Why is this? The answer lies principally in the complexity of the source tradition, and I include under that heading both manuscript and early printed sources.It may be helpful to attempt a rough classification of these sources. Sketche...
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JimSamson Chopin Editions Repertoire Advanced Literature
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Jean-Jacques Eigeldinger

Chopin and Pleyel

Translated by Deana Shuman   The first concert in Paris Chopin's first concert in Paris (February 25th, 1832) played a determining role in the artist's career, leading to his recognition as a composer and a pianist, providing him contacts with music publishers, opening the most influential salon doors to him, and thereby assuring him a st...
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R. Larry Todd

Robert Schumann and the art of musical composition

Following hard on the heels of the Mendelssohn bicentenary, 2010 marks the two-hundredth anniversary of the birth of Robert Schumann (1810-1856), a composer who will surely garner his full share of symposia, concerts, and special events reassessing his place in the European canon. To a large extent, Schumann has fared better in music histories...
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RLarryTodd Schumann 200th birthday celebration Repertoire Advanced Literature Composition
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Jane Magrath

Chopin's teaching

We all know Chopin's piano literature-almost every serious piano student plays (or aspires to play) his works. But what do we know about Chopin's teaching? After all, teaching was an important part of his life and provided his main source of income.1 What can we take from Chopin's teaching in the 1800s and apply to our own professional models ...
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Musings JaneMagrath Chopin teaching Repertoire Advanced Literature technique practice
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Barbara Kreader Skalinder

Clara Schumann: Ambivalence and resilience

The lives of Clara and Robert Schumann make great movies.Two exist: Hollywood's "Song of Love" (1947), starring Katherine Hepburn as Clara Schumann and Paul Henreid as Robert, and the German film "Frühlingssinfonie (1983), starring Nastassja Kinski and Herbert Gronemeyer. Both films present what have become typical versions of Clara'...
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Robert Schumann Clara Schumann BarbaraKreader variations Repertoire Advanced Literature
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Rebecca Grooms Johnson

How do you teach musicality?

We have all heard it from our beginning (and sometimes more advanced) students-that awful, wooden, unmusical playing. What can we do to fix it? If we tell them to crescendo to a certain note and then get softer, they stiffly climb up and down the dynamic ladder, and it sounds even less musical! Can musical playing be taught, or do some st...
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RebeccaJohnson RachelFerer JenniferDonelson beginners intermediate Advanced Literature
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Michelle Conda

A survival manual for college teachers

Every year it's the same - a group of my students prepare to leave the hallowed halls of academia and search for the elusive "job." For these students, this is BIG - and not just a little scary. As the "professor," part of my job is to prepare these changelings for what will be one of the most exciting times in their lives. For me, mentoring my stu...
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Bruce Berr

What is your plan for teaching a new piece? How does it vary for different levels of students?

Learning a new piece is like building a house. First there is a conception of the end result. The foundation is then laid - the more solid and stable, the better. Then the frame is erected and the most basic infrastructural elements are added. The skeleton then has more "flesh" progressively added until the process is nearly complete. The fini...
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BruceBerr Repertoire elementary students intermediate Advanced Literature
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Helen Smith Tarchalski

An Interview with Leon Fleisher, Part Two

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In the Autumn issue of Keyboard Companion, Leon Fleisher discussed his childhood years, his studies with Artur Schnabel and Karl Ulrich Schnabel, and the early years of his career. He also discussed the onset of focal dystonia, the diagnosis and management of the condition, and his advice to other pianists for avoiding dystonia.  "The&nbs...
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George Litterst

How do you use technology in the study of advanced literature?

Working with advanced students is challenging for many reasons, not the least of which is the issue of time management. As the students become more advanced, they tend. outwork simultaneously on both longer pieces and a greater number of pieces. For this reason, lessons must take very efficient use of the available time. The last thing th...
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Jason Sifford Linda Christensen George Litterst Advanced Literature technology covid
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