On Friday 16th January, Danielle Salomon gave a lecture/recital to the North East EPTA group, at the home of Julia Rogers. The talk was on teaching Romantic Piano and teaching Chopin to children.
Her lecture (before coffee) – traced the background of 18th century keyboard music, with the harpsichord being superseded by the pianoforte in the 19th century and how its manufacture and development gave rise to music for the home and the concert platform. The development of the pianoforte gave rise to the expansion of the musical expression needed for Romantic Piano music.
There became, she told us, a demand for music in the home and even symphonies were readily transcribed for piano duet. Now the differing piano music required new piano techniques for the change from Classical Absolute music to Romantic piano with more scope for personal expression.
She spoke of the progression of piano music from Bach to Clementi (another talk to be had!), Beethoven through to Chopin – how from the contrapuntal strands of Bach to the Classical Alberti bass of Clementi through to the cantabile opera-influenced, bel canto melodies of Chopin over an extended arpeggiated and chordal accompaniment. Different pianistic skills were needed to bring out the melody and correct pedalling essential – to be thought out since the piano of today is different again from the piano of Chopin’s time.
The repertoire that Danielle selected was from a large and very heavy bag of music!
She illustrated her choices of piano miniatures, which included pieces, to be approached before learning Chopin. Karganov Album for the Young was one of these. She expertly whisked through a number of pieces, played extracts and showed an enthralled audience the teaching techniques for each piece and listed essential music to know.
On Chopin, she described his life and how innovative he was in his music. Incidentally his pupils were not allowed to practice more than three hours a day!
The rubato tempo was achieved with a metronomic pulse of the left hand around which the right hand would play with freedom. Of his music, the mazurkas, waltzes and polonaises were discussed and performed.
Janet Nicholls conducted the meeting, and for a Monday morning was well attended. Danielle gave the teachers plenty of opportunity to give their views and join in the discussions on various points. It was a very interesting and informative meeting – and I for one look forward to the next talk…
