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Full Version: Bach, Beauty and Beyond
Quán nước đầu làng Ven > Sáng Tác - Thảo Luận - Phổ biến kiến thức > Âm nhạc - Hội họa
ex
Có cái post này khá thú vị gửi cho mọi người.
Hiện giờ em hơi lười nhưng nếu ai cần thì em dịch ra sau cũng được.

It has been my real privilege in the distant past to discuss the
matter of Bach interpretation with Charles Rosen and Rosalyn Tureck,
both musicians of singular intellect who have grappled with the
problem of "instruments" with respect to Bach's keyboard compositions.

To sum up their argument, Bach was not interested so much in
the "sound" of the instrument as in the structure of the music, its
counterpoint, its musical ideas. So, although much of his music was
written for different instruments it was often freely borrowed for
other compositions which involved different instruments. A
harpsichord concerto would all of a sudden metamorphose out of a
violin concerto, or vice versa. Harpsichord pieces could easily be
transcribed for the organ, and sometimes the opposite, although this
was rarer because of the range of the organ as opposed to the
harpsichord.

So, performance of Bach's music on the modern piano, far from being
unthinkable, is a natural progression of Bach's own practice.
Pianists, therefore, should not be reluctant to perform his music,
but encouraged, as Bach's music teaches both the musician and the
listener about the very nature of music, its rhythms, its harmonies,
its counterpoint.

I have never had a problem with Bach's music on the piano, as I was
trained on it. It was always heartening to me, as a Canadian living
in Canada, to see someone such as Glenn Gould perform Bach on the
piano. He made the music live and that was what counted for me. Ralph
Kirkpatrick, although a fine musician in his own right, did not have
such a strong appeal.

For decades Bach's keyboard music has been taken over by the
harpsichordists, who have lorded it over pianists because the
harpsichord was "Bach's instrument", as though Bach's music really
depended upon instrumental colour in order to make its points. This
example of musical theft (Bach belongs to us all, would you not say?)
has thankfully been destroyed by the common sense of musicians
everywhere, who have finally reopened Bach's music for all to enjoy
on whatever instrument. One should recall that none other than Glenn
Gould welcomed the arrival of one Wendy (nee Walter) Carlos
performing Bach on the Moog synthesizer.

So, Bach is now ours again, and Schiff (like him or not) and Hewitt,
and many other young musicians are turning to Bach's music for
sustenance, edification, pleasure, whatever, and all without a trace
of shame or clandestine glee.

All of which leads me to the recent subject of "tone" among our
professional pianists. Some have "beautiful tone", others "hard,
nasty tone". All of this is well and good. What pleases one set of
ears will not necessarily please another. This is normal; it is a
matter of taste.

However, beauty of tone is NOT something Beethoven was ever accused
of, and certainly Liszt must have been quite a banger, what with all
those broken strings and all. Anton Rubinstein was, if one believes
the contemporary accounts, a titan of the keyboard, hurling
thunderbolts! Well, I am not sure all of this was done with "beauty
of tone" in mind. And yet, Beethoven must have been a hell of a
pianist. Liszt, well, how can we argue there. Anton Rubinstein? Even
Josef Hofmann and Rachmaninoff swore that he was the greatest pianist
they had ever heard. In a way this tradition of strong feelings
strongly uttered is part of the Russian (formerly Soviet) school of
piano playing, where pianists are not encouraged to "mince their
words" when playing Liszt, or mince very much at all when they play
Chopin. Sometimes this playing comes across as a trifle raw, if not
downright hard. But the point that all of these musicians is making
is not all that different from the point made by Rosen and Tureck to
justify the performance of Bach on the piano. It is the STRUCTURE
that counts. Or, it is the EMOTION that counts. So what if you go
through your tone, the point is not the beauty of tone, but the
emotion contained in the musical phrases.

It is, therefore, a slightly demeaning thing to say about a pianist
that he has a "beautiful tone", as though that counted for more than
what it is. More important is that the musician has been able to
translate into sound, sometimes ugly even, what the composer put on
the page. To give and example: the opening of the Hammerklavier
sonata, played at Beethoven's metronome marking (which both Rosen abd
Schnabel do, actually), should not involve beauty of tone as even
part of its concerns. It is sufficient to hurl the thunderbolts, as
it were, as though they were beyond one's control. Then and only then
does Beethoven's musical IDEA come to life. In my experience Rudolf
Serkin did this to perfection. And yet, Rudi had one of the hardest,
lease ingraciating tones I have ever heard. Irrelevant to the matter
at hand.

One can readily admit that certain types of music, particularly salon
music (and like it or not, much of Chopin's music fits into this
category, as does huge swatches of Liszt), need a certain beauty of
tome. But since Chopin is not Chaminade, even his music has structure
and if that is revealed, together with harmonies, and yes, even
counterpoint, then the music does not die a thousand deaths.

So, to those who say that "beauty of tone" is where music begins, I
would say, no. Music is simply dots and dashes on a page (? câu này em thấy hơi kỳ), all of which have a clear structure. That structure needs to be heard, felt, perceived, and inwardly enjoyed by the listener and in that way, it takes precedence and by a long shot over any considerations of instrumental colour, tonal beauty, and other aspects of musical performance.

Tom Deacon

Tất nhiên có những ý kiến khác nhau về cội nguồn của âm nhạc, chẳng hạn PHilip Glass thì lại cho rằng sound mới là cội nguồn của âm nhạc, hay ý kiến khác cho là âm nhạc khởi đầu từ dance - rhythm, do đó nhạc Rap là sự trở về gốc gác sơ khai của âm nhac.
Hưng
Music is simply dots and dashes on a page.
Câu trên tớ thấy lão ấy định nghĩa có vẻ nghiêng về cách hiểu Bach, bởi Bach viết nhạc nhiều khi như kiểu một trò chơi tính toán với các nốt và hợp âm- tương tự như giải Toán. Có bản nhạc ông ấy cố tình viết đối xứng- tức là để xuôi bản nhạc hay để ngược chiều bản nhạc lại thì vẫn là một bản nhạc.
Âm nhạc xuất hiện một các tự nhiên, khi có sound và cảm nhận được sound thì con người mới sinh ra các điệu nhảy và nhịp "lựa theo chiều" của sound. Tớ nghĩ Sound là cái tự nhiên nhất và căn bản nhất chứ không phải là nhịp và điệu. Do vậy tớ theo ý kiến bác Phillip Glass. ( Mặc dù nhạc của bác này đúng là tiêu biểu cho bọn Minimalism- nghe chỉ độc có vài hợp âm nhai đi nhai lại nhức cả đầu >:( ).
ex
Em cũng không đồng ý là cấu trúc là cội nguồn của âm nhạc, em thấy nhạc non-Western nói chung khá phóng túng và buông thả về mặt cấu trúc.
Tuy nhiên ý nổi bật ở đây là, sound thì có thể là cội nguồn của âm nhạc, nhưng beautiful sound thì không (beautiful hiểu theo nghĩa truyền thống, êm tai chẳng hạn).
Beauty có lẽ là một trong những khái niệm inconsistent nhất qua các thời kỳ, mong manh và khó nhận biết nữa.
Không biết mọi người thế nào chứ nghe nhạc Bach em có cảm giác lâng lâng, nửa thấy nó được tính toán, mang tính soạn thảo cao, nửa thấy nó dào dạt cuồn cuộn, như một dòng chảy vô tận không bó buộc, đơn sơ mà có vẻ như bị chi phối bởi một quy luật phức tạp vô hình.
Cảm giác này xuất hiện từ cái prelude đầu tiên rất nổi tiếng, cảm giác khi nghe nó và chơi nó thật khó tả, như là bước vào ngưỡng cửa đầu tiên của âm nhạc vậy.
Thật tiếc là em không có đủ skill để tập tiếp 48 prelude & fugue này :'(
Quán nước đầu làng Ven > Sáng Tác - Thảo Luận - Phổ biến kiến thức > Âm nhạc - Hội họa
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