rolling chords rhythmically

[Saul Davis Zlatkovski]

I don’t know of a name for rolling the chords simultaneously, but the difference in notation is that the squiggle is in two pieces, one for each hand, instead of one long one covering both hands. You see it in the Mozart Concerto, and in the Pierne Impromptu-Caprice. Sloppy publishers will use it instead of the long squiggle also.

Playing broken chords with the beat on the bottom note deprives the top note of its meaning and will sound sloppy. The top note is the melody and in order to sing out, it has to be on the beat it belongs to. If a chord should be broken in another fashion, such as a slow arpeggio, or with the melody note in the middle, then it should be written out spacially to indicate the sequence exactly, and it turns the other notes into grace notes. There are examples of this, but I would have to go look for them. While some styles of music, particularly German Romantic, call for or allow a certain degree of vagueness about rhythm, and other situations of arpeggios where you need to finish at the right time, but have latitude up until then give some freedom, this is much less tolerated now, and it is easy to hear the difference between rhythmic and nonrhythmic playing.

I was quite impressed by Gretchen Van Hoesen’s sense of rhythm in her recording of the Gliere and Moreno-Buendia Concerti, and she spelled out chords very slowly and expressively in the Gliere, much more than I would have dared, and it is very effective. It forced me to start thinking about the rhythmic values of every note in every arpeggiated chord and to think about exactly how much to anticipate the beat. This is also very useful for ensemble, if you can say I will play these chord tones with the rhythmic value of 32nd or 64th notes, it makes it very much easier to be together.

[Elizabeth Volpé Bligh]

Yes, in that section of the Swan lake cadenza, it is common to start slowly and accelerate, then put on the brakes as you get close to the top of it. I’ve never been rear-ended, at least not so far.

[Elizabeth Volpé Bligh]

In my years with the National Ballet Orchestra, we played “Sleeping Beauty” so many times that, when a blackout occurred in mid-performance, we just kept going (like the Energizer bunny, but perhaps not as cute). The cadenza is not my favourite of the three, with a rather unappealing repeat of a seventh chord, with left-hand turnarounds. It’s not as difficult or notey as Nutcracker or Swan Lake, but there are tricky bits here and there. Re: Britten: I’ll have to go have a look at that again! I think I just played the left hand straight and the right cracked, but simultaneously. Is the left hand supposed to come after the right?

[Anonymous]

As Saul mentioned, the top of the rolled chord must be on the beat.

[carl-swanson]

The opening of the Danses is the only example I can think of where the melody is on the bottom of the chord and so the roll, with a little emphasis on the first note, starts on the beat. But whole roll is so quick, (or should be) that the chord does not feel late.

[rosalind-beck]

Elizabeth, brava for being able to keep playing “Sleeping Beauty” even in the dark!

I heard Erica Goodman perform the Britten Ceremony of Carols Interlude some years ago, and she played the chords in the spot

[Saul Davis Zlatkovski]

Carl, if you look again at the Danses, you’ll see that the melody note is ocurring in three octaves, so I don’t see why you are picking the bottom note as the melody. Each one needs to ring out clearly, and the ear naturally hears top notes as melody, with the bottom and middle notes supporting the top. Playing the bottom note on the beat makes the upper notes seem irrelevant, which they are not. It does not prevent you from stretching out the beat where you want a slower roll so the chord sustains for four beats (talking quarter-notes). I urge you to re-think that interpretation. That is almost like a jazz player who plays behind the beat.

[unknown-user]

Yes, I learnt the Danses initially like this – with the bottom note emphasized, and on the beat.

[carl-swanson]

Saul- You should read my article on the subject. Jamet worked with Debussy himself on this issue and this is what they came up with. The whole article is on my company web site, http://www.swansonharp.com. Click on the ‘Articles’ page. The quote from Jamet that still rings in my ears is, in referring to Debussy, Jamet said,”He didn’t want the chords played flat, but he didn’t want them rolled either. It was something in between, but something closer to flat than rolled.” I wrote the article because I felt that the information in it, well known to most harpists in France, should be written down lest it eventually disappear or get distorted, and also to disperse it to a wider public.

When I play the Danses, I do them they way I describe in that article, with an occasional longer ‘roll’ at the end of a phrase.

[unknown-user]

A

[carl-swanson]

Slightly cracked Rosemary? I think that’s a very good way of describing me!

[rosalind-beck]

Sam, our orchestra is playing three performances of Madama Butterfly this week.

[Saul Davis Zlatkovski]

Well then, you may attribute it to the Salzedo School then, that he wanted chords to always be played with the top note on the beat, because he felt the harp always needed to be especially rhythmically precise, and perhaps that was another innovation of his. I don’t like hearing chords played otherwise because they do lack energy and pulse and are especially confusing to hear in an orchestral context. Only in a soupy, vague kind of music like thickly orchestrated Wagner or Strauss might it make sense to me to be less precise. It would depend on the expressive function of the chord. Sometimes, like at the conclusion of a piece, the upper tones may be an afterthought. The notation should hopefully indicate that.

But then, if every note has to have a rhythmic function of some sort, then how can you play them after the beat? What are they? They don’t belong to anything. If they are leading up to the beat then they have a purpose and direction. If they are after the beat, are they even leading to the next beat? I think not, and that is why this other approach was needed. Every note has to have a place in relation to the other notes in terms of rhythm as well as melody and phrasing. Perhaps there are some stylistic exceptions to this, like in schmaltzy Viennese music, but I haven’t been there, so I don’t know for absolute certain. I am not personally very comfortable in overly rubato environments. Perhaps we can identify some of those cases.

[Tacye]

While ending chords on the beat is perhaps a good default starting position flexibility in approach has its advantages.

[unknown-user]

Yes, there have been times in orchestra, or ensemble playing, where I have been asked by the conducter (or leader of the ensemble) not to preempt the beat with a roll. These occassions have usually been after a pause of some kind, but especially after

[Author]

Posts