Studia Musicologica
Volume/Issue:
Volume 53: Issue 1-3
Bartók’s wrists and 19th-century performance practice: An essay on the historicity of piano technique
Author:
Mineo Ota Miyagigakuin Women’s University Faculty of Liberal Arts, Department of Music Sakuragaoka 9-1-1, Aoba-ku JP 981-8557 Sendai Japan

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Pages:
161–170
Online Publication Date:
26 Jul 2013
Publication Date:
01 Sep 2012
Article Category:
Research Article
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1556/smus.53.2012.1-3.12
Keywords:
István Thomán; Mária Comensoli; Breithaupt; Liszt school; piano technique
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Mária Comensoli, who studied under Bartók in the mid-1920s, reports that her teacher used “peculiar fingerings and peculiar wrist and arm technique.” Examining such comments and the recordings of the composer-pianist, it becomes clear that Bartók played the piano partly according to the 19th-century performance practice. He frequently played chords in arpeggio, even when there were no markings of arpeggio in the score, and he respected the tone color of each finger by relying on the technique of leaping. Contemporary documents suggest that one of Bartók’s technical advantages was the flexibility of his wrists. In Bartók’s case it may have been a fruit of a conscious training by István Thomán. The writings of the Liszt-pupil Thomán suggest that, like his master, he valued the “active” use of wrists, even though he basically supported the modern, “synthetic” piano technique propagated by Breithaupt, who consistently recommended the “passive” use of the wrists. It is likely that, through Thomán, Bartók learned many things from the 19th-century performance practice.

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Cover Studia Musicologica
Studia Musicologica
Print ISSN:
1788-6244
Online ISSN:
1789-2422

Senior editors

Editor(s)-in-Chief: Péter BOZÓ (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)

Review Editor: Lynn HOOKER (Purdue University, West Lafayette, USA)

Assistant Editor(s):
Patrick DEVINE (Maynooth University, Maynooth, IRL)
Anna LASKAI (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)

Editorial Board

  • Anja BUNZEL (Institute of Art History, Czech Academy of Sciences, CZ)
  • William A. EVERETT (Conservatory University of Missouri-Kansas City, USA)
  • Denis HERLIN (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Paris, F)
  • Vjera KATALINIĆ (HR)
  • Katalin KOMLÓS (professor emerita, Liszt Academy of Music, Budapest, H)
  • Valeria LUCENTINI (University of Bern, CH)
  • Tatjana MARKOVIĆ (Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien, A)
  • Pál RICHTER (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)
  • László SOMFAI (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)
  • László VIKÁRIUS (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)

 

Editorial Secretary

  • István Csaba NÉMETH (Institute for Musicology, Research Centre for the Humanities, Budapest, H)

STUDIA MUSICOLOGICA
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2023  
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Journal Impact Factor 0.1
Rank by Impact Factor Q3 (Music)
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CiteScore rank Q4 (Music)
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SJR Q rank Q3

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Studia Musicologica
Language English
French
German
Size B5
Year of
Foundation		 2007 (1961)
Volumes
per Year		 1
Issues
per Year		 4
Founder Magyar Tudományos Akadémia
Founder's
Address		 H-1051 Budapest, Hungary, Széchenyi István tér 9.
Publisher Akadémiai Kiadó
Publisher's
Address		 H-1117 Budapest, Hungary 1516 Budapest, PO Box 245.
Responsible
Publisher		 Chief Executive Officer, Akadémiai Kiadó
ISSN 1788-6244 (Print)
ISSN 1789-2422 (Online)

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