From Bach to Liszt to Rachmaninoff and more, these four pianists gave a fabulous performance.
I went to hear my friend and three of his students give their 2 pianos/8 hands recital last night. Professor of Piano at BYU, Doctor Robin Hancock and his three students presented all sorts of music last night. It was my first time attending a recital in the Choral Hall in the new Music Building on campus. The building is only a few blocks from my house, so I just walked down the hill. It was a lovely warm night.
These three students had signed up for a class of piano ensemble experience. That usually means accompanying other instrumentalists or groups, but Dr. Hancock thought these three students would do well in this very special combination. They weren't even piano performance majors. But wow! did they ever play!
Four pianists playing at the same time is fascinating to watch. Due to how the pianos were arranged, it was impossible to get a view from the audience where you could actually see the hands of all four players at the same time. That's what I like to watch --- their fabulous, fast fingers. But they switched pianos halfway through the evening, so we got to see each pianist playing for at least a few pieces during the performance.
I went to hear my friend and three of his students give their 2 pianos/8 hands recital last night. Professor of Piano at BYU, Doctor Robin Hancock and his three students presented all sorts of music last night. It was my first time attending a recital in the Choral Hall in the new Music Building on campus. The building is only a few blocks from my house, so I just walked down the hill. It was a lovely warm night.
These three students had signed up for a class of piano ensemble experience. That usually means accompanying other instrumentalists or groups, but Dr. Hancock thought these three students would do well in this very special combination. They weren't even piano performance majors. But wow! did they ever play!
Four pianists playing at the same time is fascinating to watch. Due to how the pianos were arranged, it was impossible to get a view from the audience where you could actually see the hands of all four players at the same time. That's what I like to watch --- their fabulous, fast fingers. But they switched pianos halfway through the evening, so we got to see each pianist playing for at least a few pieces during the performance.
The lid is completely removed from the front piano so that the pianists can see each other. One question kept popping up in my mind. I was close enough to see the music well enough to tell when they needed to make page turns. That got me wondering just how the composer decided which hands got to play which segments of the music and who had a hand free to turn the page. The bench mates often had to invade each other's territory on the keyboard. We could also tell when the other bench mates at the other piano were having similar issues. They must have had coordinated layouts on the pages so that the page turns matched. As a composer myself, I could imagine all of the complicated thought processes that went into making those decisions.
Most of the pieces the group played were arranged from symphonic scores from famous composers, several of those were arranged by Dr. Hancock for this group in particular. So, you could watch and hear a couple of hands playing the fancy moving parts (solo instruments from the scores), others playing the brass parts, others filling in the foundational background harmonies, and everyone approximating the rhythm sections. Or these parts were passed around throughout. Of course, when they were playing Liszt, there was plenty of purely pianistic virtuosity!
Kudos to all of them for a fine performance. Dr. Hancock let us know that all three students were getting A's for the final class grade!
Most of the pieces the group played were arranged from symphonic scores from famous composers, several of those were arranged by Dr. Hancock for this group in particular. So, you could watch and hear a couple of hands playing the fancy moving parts (solo instruments from the scores), others playing the brass parts, others filling in the foundational background harmonies, and everyone approximating the rhythm sections. Or these parts were passed around throughout. Of course, when they were playing Liszt, there was plenty of purely pianistic virtuosity!
Kudos to all of them for a fine performance. Dr. Hancock let us know that all three students were getting A's for the final class grade!
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