Christopher O'Riley Book Two affords us, through their Preludes’ repeated A and B sections, several opportunities for ornament and elaboration. I oftentimes think it’s enough to alter the dynamic contour and balance between voices, foreground and background, exposition followed by meditation. Bach does occasionally in these cases notate ornaments, and I sometimes take those directions as suggestive …
My first event in South Bend, early in the morning the day before my recital at UI/South Bend, I played a school concert at the Discovery Middle School. I’ve played a lot of school concerts in my day, but this one was unprecedented: ALL the kids who came are daily participants in Discovery’s Piano Lab …
I began work on Book Two of The Well-Tempered Clavier two summers ago at the tail end of my Book One summer project. I focused solely on Book Two since last November, working through to the end in late Spring. Every reacquaintance, whether over the months or in my recent recapitulations of each Prelude & …
On this most mournful anniversary, I offer the final Prelude & Fugue of Book One in the lachrymosal key of destiny and lamentation, b minor. The Prelude’s sepulchral procession, skeletal in its honed essence, is one of the few works in Book One in two repeated sections, inviting, I feel, a personal commentary, one’s own …
It’s unpopular to presume any long-range plan to the placement and dramatic resonance of each Prelude & Fugue within each Book, but the good-natured celebration and positivity of the penultimate B Major seems more than just a happenstance feeling of exalted summation. My 96-episode archive, Everything We Need To Know About Playing The …
Everyone’s favorite Prelude, amirite? The key to the cantilena is actually in the constant readjustment of the bass, between gravity and grace, and in the acknowledgement that here, as in all Bach, ‘chords’ do not exist, only artfully confluent voices. My 96-episode archive, Everything We Need To Know About Playing The Piano We Learn …