Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner How respected is Ludovico Einaudi in the piano community?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3u-IMopPBa8

Le Onde, one piece that I like of his.

The article was obviously a 'populist' piece, not written by one of the Tele's regular music critics.

If Einaudi made it big in the UK, it's undoubtedly down to the popular classical radio station Classic FM, who once made a big star out of the contemporary (and one-time avant-garde) composer Henryk Górecki, and his Symphony of Sorrowful Psalms. This was the recording that sold millions, thanks to CFM, who kept playing it on air:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mcfy3UmnyDY

Note the similarity with Einaudi - new-agey, repetitive, hypnotic, meditative.......

The audience for CFM rarely strays from that sort of stuff, and 1812 Overture and Nessun dorma and Concierto de Aranjuez, but at least CFM does also broadcast full-length concerts (there's Trifonov playing Rach 4 on Friday, for instance).

I'll just pretend that I didn't just see Gorecki being put in the same boat with ...einaudi...

Thanks a lot. I listened to it. Hmmmm. In the time which we usually refer to when speaking about Classical music, and shortly after in the Romantic period, so to say throughout the 19th century, this would simply have been called an "Etude", the French word, for "study", and here on the beginner forum it might be best understood as "a piece for practicing appregiated chords".

Yes, it is in the minimalism vein, but not on the level of Philip Glass or Gorecki.

But it is very accessible, and often I think of composers like this as bridges to the "good stuff." If you have someone who loves Einaudi, then would it be very hard to turn them on to Chopin or Debussy?

I think far worse is the other extreme where classical composers make no attempt to be accessible to the general public and write music for their own intellectual pursuits. It can alienate audiences who haven't studied music, and I think it's very hard for composers these days to get their music heard because of this stigma. So when there's a composer who helps bridge that gap, I think that's great for all classical musicians.

I'm not especially educated in music, but I am fine with such composers as long as they don't start preparing pianos...then I get mad...

WOW! That is an impressive thread.

73 pages spanning 10 years. I would say Einaudi is not only respected, but much loved as well.

Maybe, but it doesn't represent "the" piano community. I doubt such a thing even exists.

But sure, I'd agree he is respected by at least one of the piano communities. It may even be that his music is, in fact, what defines one of the piano communities.

I'm not fond of Einaudi. My first exposure to him was someone playing Le Onde before every orchestra rehearsal. I hated it; the way he played it at least. I heard it again recently on BBC Radio 3 and thought it sounded quite good. I heard it again, but wasn't in the mood, so I thought it sounded dull and repetitive. This is not a problem I have with Bach.

Sure, some people like sprouts and some people hate them, but even I'll have one at Christmas. I have a respect for sprouts in their own right, but I don't think that I'd consider them worth investing time into to appreciate. This is the difference, in my uninformed and likely prejudicial opinion, between 'light' and 'serious' Classical music (though Schnittke may never forgive anyone for making such a distinction).

Do we still talk as people talked in the 1800's? No. Would those people view our conversations as inornate and flat, even superficial? Also no, but only because they're dead. Classical music lives and has as many tongues as there are nations; letting each nation champion its own genre, how could those who speak with one tongue speak ill of another, without serious international conflict? Trade routes are important, and so the functional members of any nation would respect the traditions and values of another; so too is it here. Clear?

You're overcomplicating it. Einaudi is crud.

I admire the diplomacy of your detailed response, allowing differing points of view their just place.

I'd say this is quite a bit more elucidation than the topic deserves. Perhaps more concision is warranted.

Someone making millions of dollars to "compose" six minutes of drivel consisting of three chords and a trite melody is not worthy of diplomacy. It is an offense to real music and deserves to be ridiculed.

Wuffski, as no-one has really answered your question yet, here are some suggested links as requested. For the record, Einaudi describes his music as 'ambient classical'.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcihcYEOeic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEYayRe4uSs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8MzHqkNBwo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2K7D-uMH2g
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qvglWAHDak
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHUQCx969m8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUFmlZ0_6z8

(Despite my signature below, I also enjoy 'classic classical'... )

I freaking love Einaudi. I have insomnia and his work puts me right out.

It's easy to understand why advanced players see his music as silly because there's not much to it on the score. But for those of us not quite at advanced levels it's excellent arpeggio and sight reading practice while being easy on the ears.

Reality check: Most Mozart reeks of proto-Muzak, Bach's inventions are incomplete ideas for expansion into real compositions, and Beethoven's variations are how-to works; but all are played and are considered 'great works' by some and too difficult to play by many. Sometimes music that isn't so great is propelled forward by the name attached to it.

Einaudi pushes harmonic simplicity into interesting resolutions. He also creates snack food music that fills an important void. Very little useful work exists in the teaching repertoire using Classical rules in intermediate levels. He and many other contemporary "Classic light" artists provide a pleasant plethora of practice pages for us lowly piano plebes.

For those who mock: What are your sales numbers? Good music isn't linear with complexity, it has to do with hitting certain satisfaction points. Einaudi manages this with a minimum of notes and modulation - a feat more impressive than filling up pages with impossible jumps and ear busting ornaments just to up the reading level to "real music".

I doubt he's concerned with what the "piano community" thinks of him.

Thanks for the links. I'll check them out - I want to get a better idea of what this guy is doing and why it seems to be filling a gap of some kind.

I'm intrigued by the "ambient classical" description - I am thinking it is like the intersecting part of a Venn diagram, with circles for ambient music and for classical music that overlap. It seems to create a whole new genre, a little like how "progressive rock" was created when the need arose. But, unlike progressive rock, it could reach backwards in history to include music written long before the genre came into being. For example, it seems that the C major prelude from Book I of Bach's WTC might be an early example of ambient classical, especially if played very slowly. Chopin's E minor prelude, likewise.

As far as I know it's basically as described. My fiancee tells me; you never play anything with melody, it's not emotional enough - I'll have been playing some Schubert, or Beethoven or Bach. When melody becomes long enough, or there are multiple melodies, or the melody doesn't repeat exactly without variation, she finds it difficult to hear and understand and connect to the music, at least when there's only one instrument. I've learnt how to play in a way my fiancee likes; I have a verse/chorus like structure, the harmony never progresses, there's simply a slow amount of rhythmic invention and a few extra filler notes (maybe playing the melody slowly in sixths or octaves). She says it's beautiful, and doesn't understand why people don't play simple, beautiful things like those.

Einaudi, for whatever faults people wish to attribute to him, provides a relatively easy melody to follow, repeats it endlessly (just listen to Le Onde) and provides a harmonic backdrop that's not overly difficult to follow whilst still having a tiny, tiny slither of something more than simple chords. A lot of people CANNOT understand counterpoint. Whether they could be taught or not is not the question, they simply don't follow multiple melody lines. They don't retain long arcs of melody and harmony. They don't understand the significance of a change of key, they're not Classical musicians.

Einaudi, Tiersen, Yiruma, composers like these offer a taste of Classical without the hard work; obviously those accustomed to the hard work will find it too easy, vapid, boring or whatever, but to somebody whose ear is not trained to distinguish multiple musical artefacts, I'm sure it sounds every bit as intricate as Bach, as complex as Messiaen, as raw as Beethoven.

In my opinion

Then start with Einaudi, but don't end with Einaudi. In music, the more you put in, the more you get out. You just have to find the accessible music first. Not everything is a Bach fugue. When you discover how beautiful truly inspired music is, you will never go back to Einaudi.

Joel. Music is not a scalar, a linear vector reaching up and improving. If it were, there really would be a 'best' composer; surely you appreciate that it's possible someone would love Einaudi above all composers, even if they did fully understand Mosolov and Finnissy?

Your comment made me think of heroin by the way; starting out with something small, relatively simple, then needing more and more complexity to get the same high. Remember, people cry to Einaudi. Just because some forget the way they felt in the past does not mean their emotions are any more profound now.

I try never to speak for others, or assume their tastes will 'develop'. My fiancee is appreciating Shostakovich and Schnittke these days, but I don't think they'll ever be her favourite. It just doesn't work that way.

It's not about complexity; it's about the quality of an idea and what you do with it. Complexity can result as a necessity of the artistic conception, but it's not the point.

This is about as simple as it gets, but it's still beautiful and interesting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-Xm7s9eGxU