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This isn't what I would call "discovering oneself as a musician." I'd call it monkey see, monkey do. If musicianship means playing something verbatim from sheet music, then what's the point? Turning out carbon copy students who can touch type the right notes at the right time? Wow. Now that's what I call a real musician.

eweiss,

You've said the same thing enough by this point, that I believe we all get it.

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Oh, wait, Phlebas already said that!


I've recently listened to at least six different versions of Chopin's etude in F minor (10/9). My limited intelligence suggests to me that the six different monke... , ah, artists, who played it brought very different ideas to the table.

Your continued hammering away at the futility of playing other people's written music is, well, beginning to go into the 'ignore' box. A repeated assertion lacking any sympathy for other peoples' POV begins to grate. It doesn't lead to converts either.

I didn't say it was futile. To each his own. And I have just as much right to express my opinion as do other teachers here. As far as your statment about "six different artists" guess what? They aren't artists. An artist creates something original. A concert pianist recreates an original work and puts his slight interpretive spin on it. Wow. That's really artistic isn't it?

And by the way, I'm not looking for converts. I know my opinion isn't the most popular here. But my "truth" is mine to express. You don't have to like it.

So since the following Rembrandt is simply a recreation of something that exists, do you not consider this art as well? Just curious where you draw the line. Are we just merely arguing terms, an "artist" vs a "performer" when referring to pianists? Is there enough interpretation in performance to transcend simple performance and elevate it to art as some might argue that even though Rembrandt is acting as a human camera that the result is art?

Hi Bitwrangler,

Well, if Rembrandt painted this, if it came from his brush, it's his art. Seems simple enough but some people refuse to accept simple truths.

Didn't we have this discussion before? A kid fingerpainting is creating art. A writer freewriting is creating art. A pianist improvising is creating art. If it's original and from the indiviual it is art.

Now, whether it's "good" or not is an entirely different subject. Creating and recreating are two different things. Imagine a painter copying the pretty picture you posted here. Now imagine an art teacher trying to illustrate to a student the correct way to paint that same picture. This is the same thing as a piano teacher teaching students how to play Beethoven.

Sorry if that's insulting, but it seems pretty obvious that this is exactly what's being done. Which is why I have such a strong reaction to traditional piano teaching.

Thanks!



No doubt!



your usual snarky dismissal of what you devalue.



Why engage here if you are not interested in sharing, learning, and perhaps persuading? Sharing tends to work better when alternative opinions are treated with a modicum of respect. Persuasion seems out of the question.

Ah, entertainment at fireworks! That's the ticket.

Interesting. When someone doesn't like what you have to say they call it "snarky." Pianodad, it seems you are the one with the attitude.

Don't like what I have to say? Fine. Click away. I will continue to express my thoughts regardless of your approval.

What a pity, then, eweiss, if someone truly creative (in your terms) were to compose a piece for orchestra. He would then be condemning all those orchestral players to a lesser existence of mere recreation in order to bring his creation to life. I don't know how he would live with himself.

You're right.

So he should just stick to improvising new-agey music on the piano. So much for giving creativity full rein...

I don't get why this topic is so hard to understand. It doesn't matter WHAT is created. The idea of art is it's original. That's a revolutionary concept isn't it? New Age, jazz, classcial ... what does it matter?

As long as it's only for one performer - that's the point I was making. If you want to create original music for more than yourself to play, you've got a problem, haven't you.

It's not the kind of music we're talking about which creates the disagreement here. Our difference lies in this: I can see the value in what you do, but apparently you can't see the value in what I do.

And by the way, I can improvise, I encourage my students to improvise, and I compose. So when I'm performing one of my pieces (previously written down) am I being creative or am I just a typewriter?

ah, welcome to middle school logic.



I just don't understand how you can miss that the second sentence is anything but snarky. You don't have a conversation. You aggressively devalue what anyone else says. Why?

Sorry, but bitWrangler has a point. Art is often the world of creating within a box. For the classical musician, the box often is the written piece. For the composer, the box is the form .... sonata, for instance. For the painter, the box is the visual world that is being recreated by their use of learned techniques.

We may think that the composer has a greater degree of originality and spark than the 'mere' musician who recreates the composer's efforts. We may think that the visual artist who breaks the bonds of the former generation's boundaries is gifted in comparison to his or her contemporaries (or not, depending on our tastes). But the desire to squash or devalue what others do is really off putting, at least to me. The skills of the concert classical pianist are worth celebrating, yet it seems you treat them with sarcasm and condescension (as unoriginal and unworthy of much respect).

When I was in university (1980s) I spent a lot of my spare time going to see experimental films - this was at the Innis College Film Society at the University of Toronto - perhaps there's someone else out there who remembers that scene. Michael Snow, Stan Brakhage (who I do believe was a genius - unwatchable for the most part if you're me, but definitely an artist) and the like. I had a bunch of very intelligent friends who I really wanted to impress, including in particular a girl naturally enough given that I was 22.

I recall watching a 4 hour film one evening - I don’t remember who directed it - that consisted of a very lengthy series of blurry, unfocused images moving around rhythmically. It was hypnotic at times but ultimately, it was extremely tedious and try as I might I really struggled to see anything worthwhile in it at all. At one point the visual field, almost miraculously, came into focus on the wall of a tenement building, with the sun reflecting strongly off of a window. The ability to actually focus on something for the first time in hours was positively elating and an incredible relief. Then, an instant later, the focus was lost and it was back to rhythmic smudges of pure light. I spent a lot of evenings watching these films.

My favourite part of those evenings was that, during the lead up to many of the showings, the organizers played a recording of one or more of the Bach solo cello partitas, usually from the Yoyo Ma recording (though I prefer the Pablo Casals personally). There was a really interesting counterpoint between the very precise interpretation of what I think is the greatest music ever written, and these strange films that challenged all assumptions about art and esthetics.

Artists acknowledge their forbearers (Boccacio > Dante, Bob Dylan > Pete Seeger, the list is endless...)

Only dilettantes think their all their poo is new, and that is what makes them so special...

No kidding.

Currawong, I totally respect you. These are just my thoughts and opinions - contrary to what many hold here. I see the value in what you do as well! I just feel passionately about this particular topic.

I'm not trying to convert anyone. But as I read through many of the posts on this forum, I get irked from time to time. Just like many of you do when reading mine.

They are worth celebrating. They also are unoriginal. Pretty snarky huh?

Yep, as unoriginal as 99.999% of whatever anyone else in this world is doing .... except, perhaps, for the tone clusters someone is banging out in order to be original.

I think your focus on 'originality' is getting definitional and semantic, and that is tedious.

I don't entirely disagree with all your points, but there are specific situations in which an interpreter has done far more than put a slight spin on something.

I do think this is mostly likely to happen shortly after something has been composed, and the amount of spin that is added is also greatly dependent on the perfomance ability of the composer, if he is alive, and the imagination of the performer.

For instance, Rachmaninov's "spin" on the music of people like Chopin was much greater than "slight". To play Devil's Advocate in your favor, I'd say the extreme orginality of his playing of other people's music stemmed from his own composer-mentality. And I would have considered him an artist, based on his playing of other people's music, if he had never composed anything.

In the same way, if you compose something, and someone else takes your music and does something original or inspiring in a way that makes you take a new look at your music, something that inspires you, then I think the line between interpretation and creativity becomes very blurred.