The Piano As Two Different Instruments/Note Attack And Decay

So this has been irking me for a while, and suddenly the answer has hit me like a ton of bricks. Alan's book (And just about every other book, teacher, video, and pedagogy) explains the importance of subduing the accompaniment and bringing out the melody for that wonderful "Singing" sound. There is a Hanon exercise where Alan recommends Playing the thumb & pinky notes FFF and and the middle notes pp. In his own words, "Two different instruments". This works well with Hanon, but there when I played my pieces, it was hit or miss. Listening to recordings I made, sometimes it worked very well and the rest of my playing fell into place. Other times it seemed to jumble into a musical mess. I had no control over whether it "worked" or not, and well this was pretty distressing. Until recently :drumroll: For a while, I have been trying to get a very precise understanding of how to make the piano sound like two different instruments. I know you play the melody louder, and the accompaniment softer, but just HOW LOUD does the melody have to be, HOW SOFT does the accompaniment have to be, and most importantly, WHY. Once again good old Horowitz provided the answer: Every note we play on the piano, whether loud or soft, treble or base, melody or accompaniment has at least two parts. There is a brilliant, almost percussive "bang" sound when the hammer first hits the string directly, and then there is a much softer sound as the string continues to resonate. The bang is loud and very brief, and the resonance is much longer but much softer. The singing sound comes from the RESONANCE, not the "bang"! Since both the melody notes and the accompaniment have a bang and a resonance, the resonance from the melody notes has to be LOUDER than the bang from the accompaniment notes to sound out. I think this also leads to a theory to why some students don't "get" this, even when you show it to them. Specifically, I am thinking back to a less I had with my teacher where she told me I was playing the left hand too loud and the right too softly. Then she played it for me the right way. I remember thinking "Wow, there is just so much more SOUND coming out of the piano when she plays it like that", but I could not for the life of me imitate it. Now, I think, I was listening to the wrong sounds. If you DO play the melody F and the accompaniment mf (Like I was doing), the "bang" from the notes of the melody WILL stand out. You WILL hear the melody, but a bangy, choppy version of it, and this was what I was listening to (Or rather, hearing) If you play the melody F and the accompaniment pp (Like my teacher was doing), you create the murmers of sound in the left hand and the singing resonance in the right. Going back to my bad recordings and comparing them to the good ones, I have found that it was ALWAYS the case that I played badly when there was not enough resonance in the melody, and well when there was. So now, when I play a melody, I have stopped listening to the sound that comes out when I strike a note (The percussive bang at the beginning), but I listen for the sound that comes out the split second AFTER. And it has worked like a charm (Plus it shed some light on why I played badly: On certain pianos, you just CANNOT get the accompaniment to play softly enough.) There is no doubt that someone has figured this out before I have, but I have not seen such a clear instruction on exactly WHAT to listen to to get that sound.. so thank you

I'm struggling with exactly the same thoughts at the time. And I think you've found some very valuable keys to embellish the sound and the singing. Probably you'll need a very good consert grand to accomplish these subtilities. Maybe Horowitz is using the third pedal we can't see my guess is he does. There is also an element of energy and speed. If you "scratch" the key very very fast not letting the key go down more than say a millimeter you'll get a very bright distict singing tone in pp or even ppp. I've found two treatises about the pedal recently one written by Anton Rubinsteins brother and the other by Teresa Carreno both giant masters of the pedal.I can reccomend them I myself got a totally different understanding of how critical the pedal is in pianoplaying by reading these. Rubinsteins book is more in detail but they have a lot in common: Big difference between pressing the key and the pedal almost simultaneously and pressing the pedal (while holding the key) after a certain time like the rest of an eighth. The latter will increase the tone. Another thing is legatoplaying keeping the keys down as indicated even when pedaling. According to Carreno you will hear when you let the key go even if you keep the pedal down. I've always been spelled by Horowitz incredible sounds (who hasn't) and you can here all these subtilities especially in recordings. It's a microcosmos created by thorough analyzing and subtle use of touch and pedal. Or more the non-use of the pedal. There are other's like Michelangeli or Zimmerman to mention some. Best regards Eric

PS Forgot to mention Alan listen to his Scriabin that's something...

Another thing is legatoplaying keeping the keys down as indicated even when pedaling. According to Carreno you will hear when you let the key go even if you keep the pedal down. What does Carreno say you will hear? Is it a reduction of the tone, or a noise associated with releasing the key?

Interesting post. I've thought a lot about this kind of stuff too and talk about it a lot when I'm teaching students. Like you, I gradually figured out the same thing for myself- largely by listening to Horowitz. In pieces like the moonlight sonata, I've often thought that the best way to judge is not to listen to the triplets but to the sustain of the long note. If you no longer hear it, THAT is what tells you there is a problem in the triplets. Bolet once said that the key to voicing is not to play the melody louder but the accompaniment softer. Horowitz was probably the greatest master of all, when it comes to this. If you listen to his voicing in even loud moments, he establishes virtually all of the sound from a rounded melody and bass and has no need to waste great effort on mere harmonic filler. In the Scriabin op. 8 no. 12, everyone else takes away from the sustain, by playing the chords too loud. Only Horowitz really knew how to keep them out of the way when it matters- before using them to swell, after the important notes have been properly established in the listeners ear. Even Sofronitsky sounds poor in this study (at least to my ears). Sadly the modern players pianists like Kissin don't seem to realise that if you try to do it by playing the melody louder, you just reach a point where there's nothing left that can take the sound any further. I recently mentioned an exercise in a post about the 4th Ballade, which you may find useful for practising this way. In a piece like op. 25 no. 1, (or op. 10 nos 3 or 6 etc), play every accompaniment notes in a very light staccato, while playing the melody notes legato and balancing the arm-weight on those alone (this needs to be done very slowly, btw). When you get to hear nothing but the resonance of the melody itself between the accompanying notes, you realise just how much sustain is possible from a melodic note when it's not being overpowered by excessive competition (and it trains your hand how to deploy the weight where it's needed, while brushing across that which needs to be light). When you go back to a normal legato, not only is it easier to voice the melody properly, but you should find it easy to keep the accompaniment lighter. Once your hand has learned from the feel of the exercise, you may be surprised how much more of the resonance that you speak of becomes available- without necessarily having to play the melody notes all that loud to get it. It's the only exercise I know of that impacts voicing abilities so effectively and so rapidly. One of my favourite moments of all time is of Horowitz in the 3rd movement of the Schumann Fantasy. In the last few bars, he suddenly drops the accompaniment down to virtually zero, so the final sigh of A to G can truly 'float'. Because the bass and harmony are already in place, he can suddenly drop down to near ppp after the melodic peak, without any 'hole' arising in the sound. It's a real pity that so few modern players exploit the full possibilities of this effect. Many of Horowitz's finest moments come from this understanding of the fact that if you want to make a sound that seems to last longer, you have to stop other notes competing with it. There's a similar thing on the last page of the E minor nocturne by Chopin-from a live Carnegie Hall recording (I think it's the 1953 concert). The way he spreads a chord up to the note G (and then lets it resonate) is one of the most beautiful sounds I've ever heard. I really wish that somebody would publish a book with rational explanations of such beautifully musical old-fashioned techniques. While the results are profound, the explanations of WHY they work (and how they can be learned) are extremely logical and are often quite simple- when viewed scientifically. I was listening to a recording of the young pianist Yuja Wang on her website (playing Vocalise) and this is exactly what was missing. It had good things, but her melody just didn't adequately resonate from note to note. There's wasn't enough depth in the tone to connect a truly cantabile line. There's a whole world of difference, compared to Gilels' remarkable performane on youtube. It always seems to me that virtually ever modern player either suffer from a lack of ability to play with depth, or the belief that EVERYTHING needs pushed up a notch. In reality, I'm convinced that when playing a bigger hall, it should be as much about playing lesser notes even softer than you normally would. I'm sure Horowitz thought this way, judging from the sound on his pirate recordings. The other day I heard Murray Perahia from the back of an enormous symphony hall in Birmingham. His Bach partita in b flat actually sounded rather loud, even from the very back. The idea that should be seen as 'projection' to the hall would be absolute nonsense. Conversely, many of his FFs in the Appassionata felt thin (some barely louder than the Bach!) or strained. In fairness, I was greatly disappointed by his lack of dynamic range allround.

The singing sound comes from the RESONANCE, not the "bang"! Since both the melody notes and the accompaniment have a bang and a resonance, the resonance from the melody notes has to be LOUDER than the bang from the accompaniment notes to sound out. Hmmm... my WHOLE BOOK is trying to empower pianists to do exactly this - that's its whole orientation! BUT: in my book do I say it exactly the way you do here! I'm grateful that we can have a conversation here and through fleshing out our ideas arrive at formulations that are crystal clear for everyone. Ditto for the posts subsequent to yours... Thanks! AFF

To Johnlink Carreno doesn't say what you will hear probably she means an alteration of tone. Hard to beleive the ear can register this.

I don't think that there is any difference to notice.

I don't think that there is any difference to notice. I wouldn't necessarily say that. A 'snatched' attack can certainly be heard with the pedal held. However, if you release slowly and with control, I doubt whether there is any issue. However, I have heard a theory that suggests that the hammers staying closer to the strings helps them to vibrate better. Personally, I'm aware of no credible reason why this should be the case, but I saw this suggested somewhere (possibly Charles Rosen's piano notes?). Anyone know more about this theory? Incidentally, Joseph Banowetz's book on pedalling is well worth a read. I was a little disappointed by Rubinstein and Carreno in the Dover volume. I didn't really find anything terribly advanced or that particularly made me think differently about what to do. Banowetz goes rather further with the principles and includes all 3 pedals. I'd never before thought about the fact that pushing a soft-pedal halfway can theoretically make an even softer sound than pushing it right down!

Nothing revolutionary in Rubinsteins book but gooing through the examples was a healthy exercise. Looking forward to reading Banowetz. The Fazioli softpedal covers only one string which is very agreeable that should than be same the thing as using half-softpedal? Some F:s have a fourth pedal gettting the hammers closer to the strings haven't tried it but I'm sure it's very useful. Could feel as cheating though..