Accompaniment Updates/Improvements?

[the elephant]

I own like five copies of each, so I’m not trying to avoid paying for this stuff — I’ve paid for these pieces many times over.

With that having been said…

I need assistance with the piano parts for the Broughton and RVW. I have them sitting here next to me, and I want to edit them both to thin out the unplayable junk that pretty much all accompanists omit anyway.

I have this mystery copy of the Broughton that has been engraved (or more likely entered into Sibelius, looking at the page layout and fonts) and want to know who rendered this and can I get a copy of the file to mess around with.

Anyone?

Bueller?

Bueller?

I have this version and want to know if it is a more recently published version (mine is handwritten) or if someone else did a new reduction from the score. (The handwritten version was apparently done by a student from his full score and is not the one Broughton worked from when he wrote the piece in 1976.) I do not play piano well enough to easily see whether this is a new version or just a cleaned-up edition of the handwritten part.

Very curious…

I am entering the handwritten solo part into Finale over the next few days to make my own edition with some changes to make it easier to read (different accidentals, spacing, and page layout in general). I do NOT want to have to do the piano part, too.

So, who knows anything at all about this piano part?

Next is the good, old RVW Concerto. I am looking to see whether anyone has ever made a digital version of the piano part — especially if some of the more idiotic writing has been smoothed out so the pianist is not cursing my existence as she reads it down. (It is truly a terrible piano part and pretty much cannot be rendered as written by one player. It is a literal reduction, and to hell with whoever has to try to play it. (Thanks, OUP. And thanks for all the stupidity surrounding this piece and for never having published an accurate edition of this work.)

So I guess I am looking to hand my pianist parts for these that are clean, readable, and PLAYABLE, and need help locating such unicorns — if they even exist.

I don't want some big battle to erupt about tinkering with published piano parts (when they were so poorly executed in the first place) so PLEASE PM ME WITH RESPONSES OR LINKS.

Thanks.

[russiantuba]

PM Sent @the elephant

[bloke]

The head of the keyboard dept. at your alma mater has some nice hand-written revisions to the RVW piano reduction.

One thing (beyond what he did) that I additionally asked him to do was to "roll" the first (of the final three) chord at the very end of the first movement - to affect a crescendo.

the other Williams:
I believe I might ditch the piano reduction, use the 5 string parts - for a string quintet, bring in a flautist and English horn player, and also use a pianist with some decent programmed midi sounds (to cover considered-to-be-important woodwind and brass chords/lines/figures)...ie. eight folks...probably not too difficult to organize, for a recital.

[russiantuba]

the other Williams:
I believe I might ditch the piano reduction, use the 5 string parts - for a string quintet, bring in a flautist and English horn player, and also use a pianist with some decent programmed midi sounds (to cover considered-to-be-important woodwind and brass chords/lines/figures)...ie. eight folks...probably not too difficult to organize, for a recital.

For newer works I have been part of consortiums for, I have requested electronic accompaniment. Composer Brooke Pierson (Pierso20 from the old board) is a tubist who wrote a tuba concerto premiered by the West Point Band a couple years ago and is making a name for himself as a composer. He had composed his concerto several years prior but refused to do a piano reduction because it lost too much of the musical intent. He sent me the solo part, but I couldn't find any band to do it because it is quite hard. I held on to it and after hearing Ben Miles do a piece of his for either tuba and orchestra or tuba and electronics, I pitched the idea to Brooke. I was supposed to premiere the electronics accompaniment in March of 2020, but we all know what happened then.

I find when I play concerto, at least piano, and even the experience I have with an ensemble, I don't get that much freedom in the fast movements, as most of it is about the cohesion of the solo part with accompaniment. Having the steadiness in a slow movement with more freedom, it keeps me honest with electronics, plus I find it conveys the musical meaning of the piece through timbral changes (and keeps audience attentiveness).

I also want to add on that I have played with great pianists, and on concerto reductions, I can tell even they struggle. One of our faculty members in my undergrad was an amazing pianist. She nailed the Hindemith Sonata, was very musical and accurate, but when I did the Gregson prior to that, I could tell the reduction was stressing the music. One example of a concerto reduction I feel does not get in the way as much are the Ewazen Concertos. Ewazen composes at the piano and then orchestrates, which I suspect makes the music easier to play.