Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Some days even J.S. Bach phoned it in

The fact that some here even consider the above to be an example of "phoning it in" is but one little reason I rarely look in these days.

Which part of "it's not really an example of 'phoning it in'" did you not understand?

Offensive much.

I don't remember addressing you. The thread's original post was my target. Whether someone decides to alter their original intent is irrelevant. They said it and that is enough for me.

Took me a while to get to this, but check out this example from the Messiah:



Notice how none of the instrument parts are written out? (except perhaps the bass). Handel expected the performers to be able to figure out what notes to play. A lot of more modern editions actually have the notes written out.

I understand your feeling on this one lol. I always try to trust my 'aesthetic insight.' If it isn't interesting to me, then surely it won't be interesting to my audience!

Then I try to find a way to make it interesting.

Maybe Anna wasn't around to edit Johann's output on the phone-in days:


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/...d-Bachs-wife-write-his-finest-works.html

Interesting. The following seems to be the primary evidence:

whats the meaning of "phoned it in" can somebody explain?

Some explanations from Urban Dictionary:

http://tinyurl.com/y297k79

Literally, to present something, whether an idea, project, product, etc. by way of a phone call, rather than in person.
Used to describe a lazy or uninspired attempt.
Minimal effort.

Perform an act in a perfunctory, uncommitted fashion, as if it didn't matter.
"She sang the National Anthem, but she was just phoning it in as far as I could tell. "

Thanks for providing the details. Need to check on this, but off the top of my head I'm thinking this is just voices and continuo, with most likely a chamber organ providing the filler (which would, of course, be improvised based no the figures, though these seem to be rather sparse in the example!). Anyway, good fodder for discussion.

A very mature philosophy.

The enervating effect of this very short passage is largely mitigated by the current practice of performing the fugue much faster than it used to be played in the olden days. However, when it is played faster, it seems almost more perfunctory to me. I guess I'm perplexed by this admittedly vey short passage in a way that is similar to Spohr's feelings about the last movement of Beethoven's ninth: " . . . so monstrous and tasteless and, in it's grasp of Schiller's Ode to Joy, so trivial, that I cannot understand how a genius such as Beethoven could have written it." Of course Spohr was talking about an entire movement of a huge symphonic masterpiece and I am referencing a single bar in an otherwise flawless keyboard piece (IMO). But it still bugs the heck out of me, however unreasonable that may seem.