http://scriabin.com/etude/ en-us Copyright 2012 Sun, 01 Nov 1936 20:18:37 -0500 An Interview Secured Exclusively for the Etude With the Famous Virtuoso VLADIMIR DE PACHMANN Who at the Age of Seventy-five Has Remolded His Entire Repertoire According to New Principles Which He Claims Are of Paramount Importance http://scriabin.com/etude/1923/12/should-piano-playing-undergo-a-radical-reform---vladimir-de-pachmann-de-pachmann.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1923/12/should-piano-playing-undergo-a-radical-reform---vladimir-de-pachmann-de-pachmann.html Interviews I have repeatedly had students come for instruction who have after great effort prepared one, two, or at the most three show pieces, even pieces as far advanced as the Tschaikowsky or the Liszt Con­certo, who barely knew what key they were playing in. As for understanding the modulations and their bearing upon the interpretations of such com­plicated and difficult master works, they have been blissfully ignorant. http://scriabin.com/etude/1923/11/basic-principles-in-pianoforteplayingsecured-exclusively.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1923/11/basic-principles-in-pianoforteplayingsecured-exclusively.html Interviews In the present we live, and we must conform our ideas to conditions that confront us, that exist, and shall continue to exist until we eradicate them. So the pianist should eliminate all that is not essential, and find what is best and most needed for his ad­vancement. http://scriabin.com/etude/1901/12/how-and-what-to-practice.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1901/12/how-and-what-to-practice.html Teaching It is useless to say that nothing aroused his wrath so much as the receipt of an invitation to play the piano at some festival concert by a "friendly" committee which tactlessly ignored the fact that he was a composer as well as a pianist. Though he was the most genial of men, I suspect that he had said to himself: "If they will not listen to my compositions, they shall not hear me play either." http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/victorious-liszt.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/victorious-liszt.html Composers Liszt's effect upon the music of the last half of the nineteenth century is by no means to be meas­ured by his own work in composition or by his great abilities as a pianist. His power as a composer was scarcely understood during his life-time, although Wagner ranked him as among the very highest in this field, and his abilities as a performer were veiled from all but a select few by his early retirement from the concert-platform. http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/liszt-as-a-musical-influence.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/liszt-as-a-musical-influence.html Composers It may help the reader to form an estimate of one of Liszt's chief characteristics if I say that he was the most loved man in history. He was loved by more people than any man I ever heard of, and I think I have not overlooked anybody of consequence in history; he was loved more devotedly, more affection­ately, demonstratively, and more enduringly. http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/liszt-the-musical-liberal.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/liszt-the-musical-liberal.html Composers From the material of his playing it seems quite certain that the early distinctions of Liszt were due to his captivating manner, which as a boy was seri­ous, charming, and full of sensibility, and as yet without the circumambient "atmosphere" of the suc­cessful virtuoso. http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/liszt-as-pianist-and-piano-composer.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/liszt-as-pianist-and-piano-composer.html Composers I am sometimes questioned as to Liszt's "method." He had none that I am aware of, although he doubtless served his time when he was a pupil of Czerny, who must have been one of the best teachers who ever lived. Probably it was to the faithful prac­tice of Czerny's etudes (from which he, in vain, prayed his father to be delivered) in his youth that Liszt owed those fine-spun fingers of his, for his finger-technic was something marvelous, and made everybody else's seem coarse and heavy in compari­son. http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/liszt-as-a-teacher-by-amy-fay.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/liszt-as-a-teacher-by-amy-fay.html Composers http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/technical-phases-of-piano-playing.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/technical-phases-of-piano-playing.html Pianists http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/the-modern-piano.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1902/05/the-modern-piano.html Pianists If given a certain page of music to study, the average pupil plays it through time after time in the hope that it will improve of itself, the Sevcik method would be to play it through at speed, and to observe the places that do not go well, or at all. Having picked out the difficult passages, the pupil then commences to dissect them to see what the difficulty really is, and if it is a combination of difficulties, to master them one by one, and then combined. A favorite prescription of Sevcik's is: "Jede Vier Noten Hia Und Zurúck." That means "every four notes forward and backwards." It is not so unusual to find some pianist who has taken four notes of a passage, then the next four notes, and so on. But to Sevcik that was objectionable. He wanted the first four notes, then the four notes starting with the second note, then four notes starting with the third note, and always forwards and then back. In other words if we call the first four notes one, two, three, and four, the order of practice would be: one, two three four, four three two one, -- first very slowly, and gradually more rapidly, until the four notes can be played more rapidly than the tempo calls for. Then two, three four five, -- five four three, two, -- and so on to the end of the passage. http://scriabin.com/etude/1922/01/what-the-piano-student-could-learn-from-the-violin-teacher.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1922/01/what-the-piano-student-could-learn-from-the-violin-teacher.html Pianists Young pianists nowadays are fond of placing some of [Bach's] big works on their programs. Well and good; if they play the notes with clearness and precision and give a general idea of the form of the compositions. When I see these programs I say--if the player is young--no, he has not lived, he has not the life experience to play such things. When one is twenty one cannot fathom the mysteries of Bach. Neither at thirty. At forty one begins to understand; at forty-five, yes, at forty-five, one should have arrived at years of experience--of life. But, lest these words should discourage young students and players who like to play Bach's music, I hasten to say that I encourage them to study much and deeply into the works of this great master, for this study will bear rich fruit one day, when experience has prepared the soil and fertilized it. http://scriabin.com/etude/1923/08/alexander-siloti---leaves-from-a-virtuosos-note-book.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1923/08/alexander-siloti---leaves-from-a-virtuosos-note-book.html Interviews A teacher who has given us a Liszt, Thalberg, Döhler, Wilhnarr, DeMeyer and other great performers, cannot be ignored, though some of his studies may have become old fashioned from having others of more recent date take their place. Recently, we have had sent us a selection of Czerny's etudes which we can earnestly recommend in full. http://scriabin.com/etude/1891/08/education-of-pianists-no-iv.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1891/08/education-of-pianists-no-iv.html Teaching BY J. S. VAN CLEVE. Every one knows that the waltzes of Chopin are not waltzes; that is, not pieces of tuneful clockwork running on three-cogged wheels of rhythm, but impulsive caprices, coquettish fantasies, flowing in the general outline of waltz measure and waltz form. There is, perhaps, no one... http://scriabin.com/etude/1887/11/a-waltz-of-chopin.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1887/11/a-waltz-of-chopin.html Pianists Concert pianists, who depend upon their pupils to simply imitate them, and who fail to give them correct ideas as to the most advantageous way of practicing and studying, are really doing nothing to promote the most healthful improvement of the technique and style of their pupils. http://scriabin.com/etude/1887/11/piano-playing-and-general-musical-instruction.html http://scriabin.com/etude/1887/11/piano-playing-and-general-musical-instruction.html Pianists