The Well-Tempered Ear
Classical music: Why do we love Chopin? Ask pianist Jeremy Denk
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By Jacob Stockinger
I can’t think of anyone who doesn’t like playing or hearing the music of Chopin (below).
Can you?
But just why the 19th-century Romantic composer has such universal appeal is hard to explain.
One of the best explanations The Ear has read came recently from pianist Jeremy Denk, whose essay on “Chopin as a cat” appeared in The New York Times.
Denk, who has performed two outstanding solo recitals in Madison, is clearly an important musical thinker as well as a great performer. You can also see that at once if you read his excellent blog “Think Denk.”
The Ear suspects the current essay grew out of some remarks that Denk gave during a lecture on Chopin’s pedaling at the UW-Madison, and will be incorporated into the book he is working on that includes his previous acclaimed essays in The New Yorker magazine.
Denk (below), who has lately been performing an intriguing survey concert that covers 600 years of music, thinks that Chopin’s uniqueness resides in how he consolidated and fused both conservative values and radical, even modern, innovations.
To the Ear, it is the best modern analysis of Chopin that he has read since the major treatment that the acclaimed pianist-musicologist Charles Rosen wrote about the Polish “poet of the piano” in his terrific book “The Romantic Generation.”
Moreover, the online web version of Denk’s essay is much more substantial and satisfying than the newspaper print edition. It has not only audio-visual performances of important Chopin works by major artists such as Arthur Rubinstein and Krystian Zimerman, it also suggests, analyzes and praises some “old-fashioned” historical recordings of Chopin by Ignaz Friedman, Alfred Cortot and Josef Hoffmann.
Now if only Jeremy Denk would record an album of Chopin himself!
Here is a link to the Chopin essay:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/04/arts/music/jeremy-denk-chopin.html
Enjoy!
Please listen to the wonderful clips that Denk suggests.
Then tell us what pieces are your favorite Chopin works, big or small, and what performers are your favorite Chopin interpreters.
The Ear wants to hear.
Tags: Alfred Cortot, analysis, Arthur Rubinstein, Arts, Bach, Ballade, barcarolle, Baroque, Beethoven, big, blog, cat, Chamber music, Charles Rosen, Chopin, Classical music, Compact Disc, composer, conservative, consolidate, essay, explanation, feline, Franz Schubert, fuse, harmony, hear, historic, Ignaz Friedman, important, innovation, interpreter, Jacob Stockinger, Jeremy Denk, Johannes Brahms, Josef Hofmann, Krystian Zimerman, lecture, Love, magazine, major, Martha Argerich, melody, modern, Music, musicologist, New York Times, Newspaper, online, pedal, pedaling, Piano, play, poet, Polish, Prelude, print, radical, read, record, recording, Romantic, small, SoundCloud, survey, The New York Times, The New Yorker, think, Think Denk, United States, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, values, web, Wisconsin, Wisconsin Union Theater, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, YouTube
Classical music: Trevor Stephenson will teach a class on the piano music of Claude Debussy in January and February. The deadline to register is Jan. 20.
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By Jacob Stockinger
Our good friend Trevor Stephenson — who is usually an eloquent and humorous advocate of early music as a keyboardist who founded and directs the Madison Bach Musicians — will be offering a class at his home-studio about the piano music of the early 20th-century French Impressionist composer Claude Debussy (below).
The class will take on four Monday evenings: January 26, February 2, 16 and 23 from 7 to 8:30 p.m.
Those who know Trevor Stephenson (below top) know that he is an articulate and witty explainer, a fine teacher who can reach listeners on all levels. And he will use a 19th-century piano that is close to the kind the Debussy himself used (below bottom).
TOPICS include:
. Debussy’s life and musical influences
. Construction and tonal qualities of the 19th-century piano
. Modes, whole-tone scales, harmonic language, tonality
. Touch, pedaling, sonority
. Fingering approaches
. Programmatic titling, extra-musical influences, poetry and art
REPERTOIRE includes:
. Suite Bergamasque (with Clair de Lune), Preludes Book II and Children’s Corner Suite
. Two Arabesques, Reverie and Estampes (or “Prints,” heard at the bottom in a YouTube video of a live performance by the magical and great Russian pianist Sviatoslav Richter in 1977 in Salzburg, Austria.)
The course is geared for those with a reading knowledge of music.
The classes will be given at Trevor Stephenson’s home studio (below). It is located at 5729 Forsythia Place, Madison WI 53705 on Madison’s west side.
Enrollment for the course is $150.
Please register by January 20, 2015 if you’d like to attend. Email is: trevor@trevorstephenson.com
Tags: Arabesques, Arts, Austria, Bach, Baroque, Children's Corner Suite, Clair de Lune (poem), Classical music, Claude Debussy, Debussy, Early music, Estampes, fingering, France, French music, harmony, Impressionism, Jacob Stockinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, Madison, Madison Bach Musicians, Music, pedal, Piano, Preludes, Reverie, Russia, Salzburg, Suite bergamasque, Sviatoslav Richter, Trevor Stephenson, University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Music, University of Wisconsin–Madison, YouTube
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