Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Valentina Lisitsa - Show Off!

lol sure I'll respond to a good challenge. My dad's asleep so I can't practice... why not.
I'm sure there are many people on this forum who think Liberace was the greatest pianist who ever lived. That's too bad.

pianojerome-I'm sorry you like lame sauce-personally I prefer a nice bechamel. I really enjoyed your pun on broken chords lol. Duct tape is indeed a potent force in the world. So is vodka!

all I know is I don't envy Lisitsa's technique.

Sorry to break the rhythm of the thread, as I've been busy with work and I'm catching up on the forum...just saw that Rach Etude referred to earlier.

What incredible precision! Can't say the piece touches the heart musically, in my opinion, (sorry Rach old boy) but as a study in precision this is an outstanding performance. Wow. I feel like such a fat-fingered fumbling buffoon after watching that

pianojerome: in relation to what is written in the score, I meant (and thought I wrote!) that the score is not necessarily to be slavishly followed. However, when it comes to a composer's recording of his own work and it differs from the score, what does that mean?

For my part, I don't think it's designed to be an emendation of or improvement to the score. It's an interpretation. I think Mr-Kitty is plain wrong to suggest Rachmaninoff tried broken chords, didn't like the effect and so didn't put it in the score. Rachmaninoff was well-known to have performed works in the same manner time and again once he had worked out the interpretation in his head. He was not one for spontaneous experiments in recording. It is also inconsistent with the fact that Rachmaninoff recorded several takes of the second concerto which he rejected, so if he didn't like the effect, he would have abandoned it.

But breaking a chord is also different from changing notes. It is the sort of thing that need not be written into the score. So many pianists break chords for dramatic effect. Rachmaninoff was equally entitled to without it affecting the integrity of his own score.

In addition, it is worth bearing in mind the performance practice of Rachmaninoff's generation of pianists, which was to tinker with the score in the pursuit of interpreting a piece. For example, Rachmaninoff's treatment of dynamics in the Chopin Bb minor piano sonata and his own works (for example the second movements of the second and third concertos). He also added or changed notes to a couple of his preludes in recordings, but they are not followed today. He wasn't right or wrong: those was his interpretations (though admittedly very compelling ones given that he wrote the pieces).

This is different from the technical challenge of not being able to reach a tenth, but my view is that such a technical challenge does not disentitle you to play the piece. There are some exceptions (for example some Liszt which would sound daft if you don't have the hands for it), but musicality is generally more important than hand span.

ecm: I'm so glad someone shares my view of Lang Lang! I thought I was the only one. I fail to understand the hype. His Carnegie Hall CD was terrible. Sorry to all the Lang Lang fans out there, but it seems to me to be a case of marketing over substance. [timbo dives for cover]

Lang Lang is incredibly talented. He is a great showman in the tradition of Liberace. Perhaps one day he will become a great artist as well.

I like the opening chords solid, as written. Does that make me some kind of evildoer?

You and ecm are not the only ones on this board.

No, not at all, and don't let anyone tell you that.

If I prefer to break the opening chords, that does not in any way imply "rolling" them, just taking the bottom F as sort of an upbeat- like Rachmaninov did. I can comfortably take the first chord unbroken, but the others get a bit dodgy. Rachmaninov, obviously, had no such concerns.

it's just so juicey to take all 8 solid
give it a try. And then the 9th chord (C-) which HAS to be broken is that much more special.

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Originally posted by Mr_Kitty:
.....you probably like Liberace too

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What do you mean?

No, he wasn't that type of guy.

I agree. He certainly was the type of guy to encourage interpretations of others playing his own works, although different than his own.

And we all know his anecdote with Scriabin when he was playing a Scriabin piece and Scriabin told him "It does not work this way"

Mr_Kitty: there's definitely nothing wrong with you preferring to play the chords without breaking them (so do I, for that matter) but your earlier post indicated that breaking them was wrong because Rachmaninoff did not indicate it in the score.

Argerichfan: so no doubt you'd agree that Lang Lang is a far cry from Sergio Thiempo, who I heard on Saturday playing the Chopin first concerto.

Most definitely agreed.

Valentina plays extraordinarily (the broken cords subject is a minor one), but she’s neither evil or magic. She's not a witch, as Argerich (sorry the rhyme, it's not mine). That’s important to me when I hear a woman playing. And when I say evil, I mean not a personal evilness but an artistic one, as an artist must remain morally unrestricted.

"Witch" is a rather odd word choice, or perhaps you were referencing her inner witch?

It's hard to tell which witch is which!

Cheers!

What would constitute musical morality?

I mean ‘witch’ as Hecate goddess, in the sense of magic, ritual, obscure and charming not the posterior ‘heretical’ significance. It’s of course an inner daimon or genius but in some way connected to forces of nature that are not always rational.
Amorality in music means to me that a musician must been able to represent all kind of human feelings unrestrictedly. Even evilness if necessary.

I joined this forum to add to this thread. I support and follow Valentina Lisitsa, I have seen and once again am about to see her perform live and after a lifetime of witnessing concert pianists live and seeing one develop within my extended family I state - and will defend my position - that Valentina is divinely gifted musically and technically. There is much more to her than speed and accuracy - the world is full of fast, accurate pianists but after just one afternoon's exposure to Valentina on Youtube watching a wide spread of composers played by her I was totally captivated. From that point on I have watched her legion of adoring fans give her the praises she deserves on www.myspace.com/valentinalisitsa


Please also look at just one article that shares my sentiments.
http://www.mrs.umn.edu/register/article.php?index=0&issue=4&section=ae&volume=17

I've heard that Rachmaninoff helped at least one small-handed person rewrite those opening chords in the 2nd to make them playable (instead of, as was suggested in another post, telling the person to play a different concerto). Too bad he didn't provide an ossia in the score. Maybe we should just be grateful that he didn't write a lot more stuff unreachable-by-regular-hands than he did.

And, yes, judging from the various YouTube clips, Lisitsa is not a very interesting musician, although she can play way fast. Too robotic and too reliant on technique effects for my taste. But I'll admit that when I was much younger, I might have felt differently. Funny how time changes one's perspective...

But why are there so many these proponents of insubstantial virtuosity all over the place right now? It's practically like the middle of the 19th century is being replayed all over again. These virtuosi are just crawling out of the woodwork, and seem to have found an audience of extremely avid fans. It's really very strange.

Although I understand the "wow" factor (and enjoy it a lot myself), I also think that there are other factors in music that are at least as important. Make that "more important". It really is disturbing to me that a lot of people seem not to have any idea at all of why high-level technical prowess together with just a rudimentary, barely cultivated musicality just doesn't add up to "great".

I am not a big fan of Lisitsa.

Although I don't agree with how the OP said it, I do believe that her interpretations and musicality are often a bit lacking, sometimes in place for technical bravura.

I've seen her live a number of times and every time I was left disappointed. Her Rach 2nd that I saw was quite poor. I was disappointed to hear that Gutierrez, who was supposed to play it, had canceled. After I left the hall, I was more disappointed than before. Her performance was underwhelming to say the least. I often found her phrasing to be a bit sloppy and she seemed to have trouble producing enough sound to compete with the orchestra.

Yes, she has many achievements. Yes, she has a very large repertoire (although it is only average compared to other major touring artists). But, in my humble opinion, there are so many better pianists out there that I don't believe she has quite yet reached the plateau as one of the greats.

That's just my opinion though.