Charles E. Brown

As a classical musician, and listener, I have one main criteria for any performance: Teach me something new about the work. If you are going to travel down well-worn roads why bother?

One of my loves in life is listening to Sirius-XM Radio.  I have it on my computer and in my car. They never fail to find the best of performances.

There is no work more over-played and associated with classical music than the Beethoven 5th Symphony in C-minor. I have heard hundreds of good and bad performances of this work over many years. However I have never heard a performance of this symphony like I heard on the radio 2-days ago.

The performance was conductor Sir Roger Norrington conducting the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart orchestra and released in 2002. I felt like I was hearing the work for the first time.

Norrington conducts with a VERY brisk tempo. But instead of sounding rushed he brings out a lot of rhythmic vitality and excitement. He also brings out remarkable inner voices that I had never paid attention to before.

I had to pull into the parking lot of my destination and hear the rest of the performance. When I got home I jumped into iTunes to sample the recordings of the other 8 symphonies. I purchased them all (should I join Spotify?).

Whether you just want a good recording of a well-known work, another set of the Beethoven Symphonies, or a first complete set, I cannot recommend these recordings highly enough. Just a suggestion: get the 2002 releases rather than his earlier ones.

Thank you to Sirius radio for introducing me to these wonderful works.

Vladimir Horowitz and Virgil Fox were very different musicians other than the fact that one was a pianist and the other an organist. Yet. remarkably, both were very slow learners and both had a very similar practice technique. These practice techniques were painstakingly meticulous and slow. These same techniques can be used whether one is learning how a Bach Organ Fugue, an early Haydn sonata, or Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit.

Here is a summary of the technique:

1. Start with a vision. Even if it takes weeks before taking the work to the keyboard, think it through and set how you want it to sound in your mind.

2. Start by setting the metronome to a tempo so slow that you can play through the entire movement, or section, perfectly. I have started many a major work with the metronome set at 32nd note = 40. It takes forever to play, but is worth the detail.

3. If you are pianist practice without pedal. If you are an organist, practice each stop change and swell manipulation as if it were notes in the score so that the mechanics move properly.

4. Even if practicing late romantic works, do not use a pure legato. Instead, use a good articulation with a slight gap between notes at a slow tempo. As tempo increases you will get a natural sounding legato.

5. Lift and attack notes simultaneously. Do not be sloppy about it. What would happen if the notes under your fingers were a chorus where each member cut off and came in at different moments?

6. Even at ridiculously slow tempos, try to get a musical sound.

7. Do not increase the tempo until you can play the movement, or section, through perfectly twice. Only then increase the metronome by one notch.

8. At each stage analyze the structures, phrasing, and musical possibilities.

9. When getting to faster tempos it may be necessary to back the metronome back a few steps when beginning practice.

10. Never play a composition in public until you have it memorized at least 2-months in advance.

I hope these steps help you develop a good practice technique early on. I use it to this day and it always works.