A Singular Sensation
By Matthew Heil
Public Relations Manager
It must be summertime! The New York Times has a particularly entertaining article published in yesterday's edition, concerning an upcoming concert of the "Goldberg" variations by Bach. The work was intended for a two-keyboard harpsicord, and will be performed there in New York on a similarly-styled two-keyboard piano. Makes me wonder just how many works of classical music were created for uncommon instruments specifically. A theremin concerto, anyone?
Public Relations Manager
It must be summertime! The New York Times has a particularly entertaining article published in yesterday's edition, concerning an upcoming concert of the "Goldberg" variations by Bach. The work was intended for a two-keyboard harpsicord, and will be performed there in New York on a similarly-styled two-keyboard piano. Makes me wonder just how many works of classical music were created for uncommon instruments specifically. A theremin concerto, anyone?
12 Comments:
When asked if he would like to acquire one of these double keyboard pianos for his baroque orchestra, Musica Nova Music Director Warren Cohen replied:
I knew of this piano, and I knew Gunnar Johansen slightly as well, who I heard praise it enthusiastically. Of course any performance of the Goldberg on a 20th century Steinway is far from "authentic!".
The piano is full of these interesting by-ways in its history, such as the Pedalier, another instrument I am very curious about and for which
Schumann wrote some and Alkan wrote a lot of music, including some of his finest works. It was a piano keyboard built by Erard that had a pedal attachment played by the feet like an organ. The only person I ever spoke to who had played one said it had a gorgeous sound, which I find both intriguing and hard to believe. I know of no recording of it,
and I think only one has been restored to playing condition in recent years.
There were other double keyboards, organomic keyboards, curved
keyboards, angled keyboards, quarter-tone keyboards (there is a part in Ives 4 for one). Of these, I think this double is one of the better and more interesting experiments. But we will spring for the excellent Roland C-80 electronic harpsichord, which also has a plausible positive organ and a celesta, long before we do that!
Local piano technician, educator, and professional hornist Gary Miles wrote:
"We love going to AJ's on Sunday mornings and buying the NY Times to read while we eat breakfast. We saw the article about the double-keyboard piano and talked through the possible machinations of its operation since none of it was spelled out in the article written for non-technical people.
I'm hoping that someone in the PTG (Piano Tuners Guild?) organization will write an article about its make-up. I would be very curious. The upper keyboard is said to play with more resistance than the lower keyboard. We were trying to figure out how much more weight the upper keyboard (playing and same note an octave higher) would be.
The Sauter piano company manufactures a piano called a "micro-tonal" piano which has all the strings the same length and the hammers the same size and through its 88 keys has a range of exactly ONE octave - pitch difference from one key to the next is 1/16 of a tone. Must be a nightmare to tune! And strange to listen to.
Hey Sonny, the New York Philharmonic who you constantly disparage in favor of the Phoenix Symphony finally got it right. The selected Alan Gilbert, a true conductor and musician to lead them as Music Director starting in September of 09. Maybe by then the Phoenix Symphony will get it right.
I think it is a little early to say the Phil got it right. It is also not fair to then imply that they had gotten it wrong before Gilbert. Maazel, Masur, Boulez, Bernstein. These names are pretty solid. Hometown pride or inferiority aside. They are playing a different game up there. I am not sure it is fair to compare Phx whatever one's motives.
Hey you, the "disparaging anonymous" irritant. You've got it all wrong. I am a Native New Yorker. I fly to New Your JUST to see a performance by my beloved Philharmonic.
I've sobbed all the way through Carmina Burana conducted by Zubin Mehta. Lenny was dynamic on the podium when he premiered Corigliano's Clarinet Concerto with Stanley Drucker. I cheered for Pierre Boulez when he dared to spring Mahler 7th on a matinee audience. I loved Leonard Slatkin's rapport with the orchestra and was surprised when Lorin Maazel was appointed. I am very happy that they made such a radical appointment that will shake them up musically.
I am making plans to see both the NY Philharmonic and the Brooklyn Philharmonic with Maestro Christie during the coming season.
So don't go around anonymously libeling me! Who in their right mind would claim that Phoenix has a better orchestra than the world's greatest city? Don't take me for an idiot! Take it back. Name yourself.
Here is an article about some unorthodox instruments.
www.nytimes.com/2007/07/20/arts/music/20perc.html?ref=music
This comes from the Alex Ross blog.
"The bias toward elder-statesman directors at the erstwhile Big Five orchestras is a quite recent phenomenon. Peter Dobrin points out that both Eugene Ormandy and Riccardo Muti were younger than Gilbert when they began their tenures with the Philadelphia Orchestra. He might have added that Stokowski was all of thirty. For most of the twentieth century — 1912 to 1993 — the Philadelphia was led by conductors who were under forty when they first took over. What really makes Gilbert stand out in the above list is not his age but the fact that he's American. Sad to say, that's still news in these parts."
John Corigliano scored "The Mannheim Rocket" for . . . percussion, including an "amplified musical saw [or Theremin]." Unfortunately when the Phoenix Symphony presented the piece last season, the percussion section failed to produce either instrument or sound effect. Rumor has it that one of the players tried to "fake it" using a vibraphone. That was pathetic. The part was totally missing. That means the audience did not hear the piece as intended by the composer, who happened to be present at Symphony Hall.
I know of at least one college professor in town who owns a theremin. He has performed it with his rock band and has allowed his students to use it in percussion ensemble pieces. I cannot believe that a professional organization like the Phoenix Symphony could not rent or borrow a theremin for the concert. Let's make sure such a shameful incident does not happen again.
My buddy Contra-Cat honks in:
Gee...if I'd only know. I happen to own a theremin. I built it myself. For Halloween. I need to add musical saw to the repertoire anyway in case the Khachaturian piano concerto comes up.
My fellow Critic Ken Lafave reports on the "THEREMIN" incident:
"I was with John (Corigliano) that night in the audience. He was not pleased, though he's an easy-going kind of person so he wasn't angry or anything like that.
I understand you can buy Theremin kits over the Internet fairly cheap."
So you want to hear a Theremin Concerto? Actually there are many to choose from. Here are some of the biggies:
Lydia Kavina is the leading thereminist active in the world today. The granddaughter of Leon Theremin's first cousin, she was the inventor's last protégée. She began studying the instrument with him at the age of nine, and was concertizing by age fourteen. Her theremin concerto, The Seasons of the Year (1997), was premiered by the Boston Modern Orchestra Project conducted by Gil Rose.
Anis Fuleihan's Theremin Concerto was premiered by the formidable Clara Rockmore with Leopold Stokowski and the New York City Symphony in 1945.
Then, there is the "Spellbound" Concerto by Mikos Rosza, live with Berlin Philharmonie, theremin soloist is Carolina Eyck. Spellbound is probably the first and most widely heard of all theremin recordings. The film's director himself, Alfred Hitchcock, commissioned Miklos Rosza to create a 'new sound' to characterise the haunting paranoia of Gregory Peck's character. Hitchcock and the film's producer David Selznick hadn't heard of the theremin and "weren't quite sure whether you ate it or took it for headaches" but decided to give it a go.
FYI: Phoenix Symphony Percussion Section.
Junior Theremin electronic kit ML209 is economically priced at:
Only $ 21.95 + shipping!
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