Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner If Clair de Lune is so "easy"...

Poor David Oistrakh. One of the greatest violinists the world has ever known, never learnt to count to 9. He couldn't go beyond 8. His inability to count to 9 completely ruined this special recording made in France, land of Debussy's birth. Several members of the audience were brought to tears. When asked whether it was the emotional impact of Oistrakh's playing that had reduced her to tears, one elderly lady responded, "Mais non, monsieur. I weep for the fact that poor David is unable to count to 9."

Certainly made me weep (well despair actually), but then maybe I'm the sensitive type.

What the heck? You listen to him pour his heart out on this piece and after the performance all you guys say is, "Sorry bud, you didn't count to 9."

Thomas, Thomas, it's called irony.

It is not easy if you want to play it really well, but I didn't know it was 10th grade.

Same... I was thinking around grade 8/9 (there is a big leap in technical difficulty and length from 9 to 10)

I don't the difficulty level of a piece should/would ever be how hard it is to play poorly.

I never realised that you are personally responsible for the idea that different people find different things challenging. You wouldn't believe how many people have been ripping you off! It must really get you down, knowing how many people continue to stomp about in your patch, all over the world. Unlike these light-fingered frauds, I'll be sure to give you credit via a footnote, in the event that I too should make any future reference to your pioneering observation. Do you also hold legal copyright over such notions as that which states that apparently simple pieces can be highly challengingly interpretatively, or that the real difficulty in classical sonatas lies in the articulation and phrasing? If so, do let us know, so you can take due credit.

In fairness, he didn't suggest that at all. He simply said "if you want to play it really well". That's a fair point. There are a heck of a lot of pianists who can play traumerei to a decent standard, but who don't approach a truly incredible pianist. In a sense, Traumerei really isn't that hard, except to play to an overwhelmingly high standard. The same applies with Clair de Lune. If we're talking about what's required to be outstanind, you could say that ANY piece is hard to play to a truly high standard. In fairness, it is no wiser to judge difficulty from what is required to meet the very highest of standards, compared to what's required to meet a poor standard.

I find it hilarious that you object to others (me in this case) acting in the very same way you do; mean and vindictive. In truth, I'm laughing my arse off just now.

As I'm sure you know already, I enjoy tweaking brittle people (those familiar with the Dilbert comics will get that), and that was the whole point.

Not. A. Song.

Wow. And professional musicians performing for television at that!!

Clayton -

Your wording is basically the same point I was making except I phrased things as a double negative. Any piece becomes harder as one increases the level or performance used as the reference. Since this statement applies to Claire de lune and every other piece it becomes superfluous. It also comes off as sounding like the poster is saying "most of you who play this piece don't really play it very well".

He must have cried all the way to the bank!

Hey keyboardklutz,

Now that you've posted the orchestral version with the white bird (stork?) flying under the moonlight, I can't get the images out of my head when playing it.

It actually helps set the mood lol.

Hey, why don't you try sitting down with the music and count to 9 while listening to Stowkowski? You might learn something. Incidentally, I don't put his accuracy down to his conducting. I think his musicians would have rebelled if he'd asked them to cut notes short. Oistrakh's pianist was obviously a pushover.

Oh I see, right from the beginning he goes way too fast and doesn't sit on the dotted half notes. Yes, I've wondered if the pianist would be the "leader" in terms of beat, but I guess he must have told her beforehand to play a little faster. Maybe he had to go to the bathroom lol.

Actually, I've listened to different versions and many of these professional pianists like to speed things up at the middle of the third page.

That's because it says un poco mosso and en animaut.

Sounds to me like somebody must have "tweaked" you pretty damn well, judging from the accusatory tone of your post. Anyhow, perhaps the difference between us is that I don't make unsupportable arguments (like claiming the notion of difficult being subjective as my own) purely for the sake of being mean and vindictive?

There is quite a vital distinction though. You said that you shouldn't judge a piece on how easy it is to play poorly? While that is correct, I don't think anyone would ever have argued that, and I certainly don't think the poster who you responded to was suggesting it. Difficulty ought to be judged on how easy or hard it is to give a musically satisfying performance. If you consider the fact that the very best performances are difficult for any piece, to be superfluous why were you pointing out something so obvious as the fact that to play a piece badly is not hard? That clearly was not what the poster was alluding to. I'm also not clear what should come across as saying that "most of you don't play it well"? Frankly, I haven't the faintest idea what might raise that implication. If anyone sees the fact that the greatest pianists generally play better than them as an insult, I think that's something for them to work on with their counsellor.

Conversely, responding to that poster with a "superfluous" statement that you shouldn't judge a piece from how easy it is to play badly came across as being greatly accusative. He simply pointed out that you shouldn't judge difficulty from the absolute highest standard of performance. Leaping to such an extreme counter-example (and presenting it as though he might have been suggesting that sloppy performances are the better yardstick) struck me as a rather hefty implication of assault upon that poster's personal standards.