crescendo

[musicus]

The attached section is from a piano piece by Prokofiev,
Tales of the old grandmother, Op.31, No.3. There are hairpins
in meas. 2 and 3. What does the crescendo in meas.2 and 3 mean?
Thanks.

[MichelRE]

they imply a dynamic only for the right hand notes, but of course, the cresc. part of the dynamic is impossible on a piano.

[John Ruggero]

You might also work from the first edition which is better engraved. (Note how close the slurs are to the hairpins in ms. 2-3.)

https://vmirror.imslp.org/files/imglnks ... 9score.pdf

Crescendos on held notes do occur in piano music. Usually, there is an accompaniment that one can use to help create the illusion of an actual cresc. Piano playing is often a matter of "sleight of hand", literally and figuratively.

However, there is one famous case of an unaccompanied and very important cresc. on a held note at the end of the first movement Beethoven's Piano Sonata op. 81a:

op 81a.1.png (64.04 KiB) Viewed 1130 times

Here the pedal can help, as shown, but it is mainly accomplished by the player holding the C octave with gradually increasing pressure, which stiffens the body so that the resolution on the quarter note B-flat is played while in a very strained physical state and thus much louder than a normal appoggiatura resolution. Body english can play a role in a live performance.

[musicus]

Thanks. I just need a bit of help with my email notification. I wasn't notified by email about your reply. (I saw your reply only by visiting this page.) Can you look at the attached and tell me which one(s) should be checked just for a simple email notification? Thanks.

they imply a dynamic only for the right hand notes, but of course, the cresc. part of the dynamic is impossible on a piano.

[musicus]

Thank you for your comments. It made me further realize what an illusion crescendo is on an instrument like the piano. It's kinda like certain watch mechanisms, where there are so many ticks per second that there is an illusion of a sweeping motion. In your Beethoven example, the "crescendo" is created between just two notes. It seems to me, as a pianist, that the composer may sometimes want the player to feel a crescendo (possibly also in my Prokofiev example) even though it cannot be projected audibly. I do believe that the pianist's feeling may manifest physically. Recall also how when Beethoven conducted he stooped low when the music was to get quieter.

You might also work from the first edition which is better engraved. (Note how close the slurs are to the hairpins in ms. 2-3.)

https://vmirror.imslp.org/files/imglnks ... 9score.pdf

Crescendos on held notes do occur in piano music. Usually, there is an accompaniment that one can use to help create the illusion of an actual cresc. Piano playing is often a matter of "sleight of hand", literally and figuratively.

However, there is one famous case of an unaccompanied and very important cresc. on a held note at the end of the first movement Beethoven's Piano Sonata op. 81a:

op 81a.1.png
Here the pedal can help, as shown, but it is mainly accomplished by the player holding the C octave with gradually increasing pressure, which stiffens the body so that the resolution on the quarter note B-flat is played while in a very strained physical state and thus much louder than a normal appoggiatura resolution. Body english can play a role in a live performance.