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Comparative Analysis of Performances by four different pianists (2016)

Jihee Min
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Name: Jihee Min Main subject: Classical Piano Research Coach: Bert Mooiman Title of research: Comparative Analysis of Performances by four different pianists Research question: What are the differences between four performances of Beethoven’s piano sonata “das Lebewohl,” played by distinctive players and how can musician improve their analytical listening skill based upon this research? Summary of Results: YouTube is a good source of music interpretation of how a piece of music could be interpreted and performed. Listening to recordings is a wonderful way of obtaining musical ideas from the talented musicians around the world. However, I realized that when one listens to a music without knowing the music beforehand, it is difficult to understand the diverse interpretation of the music from any of the YouTube videos. This pitiful fact led me to a question: What should I do to listen with more analytical ability to obtain broaden and diverse interpretation from recordings? The research is made with comparative analysis of performances by four pianists, Emil Giles, Claudio Arrau, Dmitry Masleev, and Alfred Brendel, on Beethoven’s piano sonata “das Lebewohl” to improve pianist’s analytical listening skill. To understand diverse interpretation contained in performances of four pianists, basic knowledge of this sonata including musical analysis and historical background is presented prior to analysis of performances. Comparative analysis of performance is categorized to five main sections: Theme development, articulation, pedal usage, tempo flexibility and phrasing. In the end of analysis, one can easily witness Gilels showing clean and stable performance in general. Arrau shows the most clear and motivic transformation amongst the four. Masleev stands out with playing the most even performance. Last but not least, Brendel best demonstrates his personal understandings through a whole piece. To improve analytical listening skill through analysis of four performances, one should be able to apply the process of analyzing the performance which is used in this research to one’s own studies. The process consists of four steps: Obtaining basic knowledge of music, categorizing the things to look out for when listening, comparing their recordings according to the categories in the second point and applying what you have acquired to your own playing. Biography Jihee Min was born in South Korea in 1990. She began to play the piano at her age of 7 in Yongin where she was born. She continued her studying in specialized institution of education of classical piano, SunHwa Arts School and SunHwa Arts High School. In 2010, she came to Netherlands to widen her perspective of music and learn music in hometown of classical music. She began to study at Royal Conservatory of The Hague with Professor Naum Grubert.
typeresearch exposition
date08/03/2016
published23/08/2016
last modified23/08/2016
statuslimited publication
licenseAll rights reserved
urlhttps://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/259352/259353
published inKC Research Portal
portal issue3. Internal publication


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nameComplete Research JiHeeMin
copyrightJihee
licenseAll rights reserved
usagespdf

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