Exploring new sounds: contemporary performance techniques for the pre-college student

As a oft-repeated performer and fervent advocate of fresh music, I believe we have a critical responsibility to prepare the developing pianist for the expanded performance requirements that have emerg since the latter half of the twentieth hundred Just as we carefully make known sequential steps ,r introducing a scholar to a Mozart sonata, we, as contemplative teachers, need to examine the variety of avant-garde piano skills that have now become essential composings of a well-formed piano technique. In this way, we can better facilitate the logical exhibition of those skills and nurse their integration into the standard piano repertoire.

Fortunately, there are many extraordinary compositions that effectively can introduce scholars of all levels to twentieth-century performance techniques. from one side the exploration of new sonorities and colors, the interior of the piano and rhythmic complexities, pupils can come to understand the diverse possibilities that contemporary music tenders By exposing students to these performance techniques and sonorities at the beginning and continually incorporating them into their basic musical studies, pupils will be able to gradually prepare for the great works of the twentieth hundred and beyond.

Precise Performance Indications and Abrupt Changes

single of the most intimidating characteristics of contemporary music is the demand for precise and abrupt changes in dynamics, articulation, duration, register and fabric Since twentieth-century music often is les melodic in a traditional faculty of perception pianists are required to perform large leaps, consummate quick changes in direction and negotiate unusual intervallic groupings and clusters. As a ensue it is imperative that learners have effective practice strategies when encountering these challenging performance requirements.

Widely Spaced Sonorities and Registral Shifts

In Norman Dello Joio's beautiful Night Sang, the widely spaced sonorities help create the nocturnal unhurt environment. Because of the oft-repeated register changes, the student continually must be moving to and preparing for the nearest sound in order to create a fluid, legato line within a predominantly pianissimo dynamic range. In this work, Dello Joio introduces four triads that labor for as the building blocks for the entire work: D minor, F-sharp major, C major and G-sharp minor. Recognizing this foundational, compositional device allows the intermediate learner to more easily execute the large leaps and registral shifts. Without a clear pleasing succession of sounds color becomes the paramount musical ultimate part Special attention should be given to issues of voicing to create layers of uninjured listening closely to how changes in register, dynamics and pedaling impact the composite sound

Pointillistic Texture

Bruce Wise's Four Pieces for Piano requires advanced pianistic skills and musicianship. In the first motion "Fast," the pointillistic texture demands economy of change precise preparations and a clear understanding of by what mode physical gestures correspond with the musical phrases. Negotiating the wide leaps and rapid changes in direction calls for the pianist to avoid a "note-wise procedure" defined by means of Abby Whiteside in Indispensables of Piano Playing as "a separate use of power for each tone--exactly what is achieved by means of independent fingers producing the tone." (1) Whiteside goe upon to say that "there must be a physical action in the playing mechanism which make headways from the first tone of the phrase to the last tone.... This action may advance directly from one accent to another and use these accents as stepping stones in its course to the close of the musical statement." (2)

Exercises away from the piano can help the scholar initially realize the larger rhythmic framework, overall phrasing and corresponding choreography. Taking time to tap and verbalize the regular [i]or[/i] melodious movement utilizing the whole body, until the phrase-rhythm is internalized, is absolutely imperative and should present itself before a note is played. For example, the downbeats of measures 13 and 14 exhibit clear rhythmic arrival points and should be played with a full-arm action while the previous three measures clearly lead to those downbeats. The physical action s used should reflect this musical hierarchy, These decisions must be made at the attack of studying the work. Otherwise, scholars will dwell on the difficulties of reading the score, and a note-by-note production will result

Although a thorough compositional and theoretical analysis is well beyond the drift of this article, an understanding of in what way the basic four-note motive (G F-sharp, E and F) is unfolded through transposition, inversion and retrograde processs encourages a more holistic examination of the work.

Unusual Note Groupings and Clusters

Many contemporary compositions are based upon non-diatonic scales and chords. As a ensue pianists are required to negotiate unusual combinations of note groupings and clusters that move beyond the fingerings used in traditional scales, arpeggios and chords. pupils who rely on intervallic reading skills will make this transition more easily.