Beethoven & Czerny

[lysander]

I think we can learn a lot about great people tangentially as it were, through their relationship with other people in their life. I think this can well be true of Beethoven's relationship with the great child prodigy Carl Czerny.
Carl played the piano at the age of three, and was composing at seven. So phenominal was his musical memory that at the age of ten he could play by heart most of the works of Mozart and Clementi.
Beethoven captivated by his playing that he accepted Carl as a pupil. But obviously, Beethoven's terrific work commitments meant that he had to cancel lessons at short notice, and Carl's father took this as a personal affront to his maginficently gifted son, the lessons were dicontinued for some time.
Czenry's incredible industry produced nearly a thousand published compositions in all forms. His many other piano arrangements of Beethoven's works included the nine symphonies, six of the overtures,the septet, the Mass in C major, and the 'Archduke Trio. His writings on Beethoven and his piano music are invaluable.
I suppose we could say that Czerny never quite lived up to his early promise and that perhaps understandably he always felt to be in the artistic shadow of Beethoven.
He obviously acknowledged his debt to Beethoven in his many adaptions of his music, but Czerny's was not really a great and original musical talent. And is really one of the great musical technicians rather than pioneers. Beethoven I feel would have been touched by Czerny's acknowledgement of his music, but a little disappointed that this great prodigy had not gone on to greater new things, but there again there can only be one Beethoven and there can only be one Mozart who were prodigies and went on to fulfill their promise.
What I would like to ask is whether it is true that Beehoven had an aversion to giving lessons to child prodigies.




[This message has been edited by lysander (edited July 05, 2003).]

[Sorrano]

Originally posted by lysander:


I think we can learn a lot about great people tangentially as it were, through their relationship with other people in their life. I think this can well be true of Beethoven's relationship with the great child prodigy Carl Czerny.
Carl played the piano at the age of three, and was composing at seven. So phenominal was his musical memory that at the age of ten he could play by heart most of the works of Mozart and Clementi.
Beethoven captivated by his playing that he accepted Carl as a pupil. But obviously, Beethoven's terrific work commitments meant that he had to cancel lessons at short notice, and Carl's father took this as a personal affront to his maginficently gifted son, the lessons were dicontinued for some time.
Czenry's incredible industry produced nearly a thousand published compositions in all forms. His many other piano arrangements of Beethoven's works included the nine symphonies, six of the overtures,the septet, the Mass in C major, and the 'Aarchduke Trio. His writings on Beethoven and his piano music are invaluable.
I suppose we could say that Czerny never quite lived up to his early promise and that perhaps understandably he always felt to be in the artistic shadow of Beethoven.
He obviously acknowledged his debt to Beethoven in his many adaptions of his music, but Czerny's was not really a great and original musical talent. And is really one of the great musical technicians rather than pioneers. Beethoven I feel would have been touched by Czerny's acknowledgement of his music, but a little disappointed that this great prodigy had not gone on to greater new things, but there again there can only be one Beethoven and there can only be one Mozart who were prodigies and went on to fulfill their promise.
What I would like to ask is whether it is true that Beehoven had an aversion to giving lessons to child prodigies.

Thank you for that information. It raises a question that maybe the pianists here can answer. I've just begun going through some selected excersizes by Czerny (Germer arranged the order of the excersizes) published by Alfred. Will this be helpful to em or am I wasting my time on it? (I rather suspect that any form of excersize as opposed to none would be helpful.) I am also working on Hanon. And how helpful would these excersizes be in working on Beethoven Sonatas?

[Peter]

Originally posted by Sorrano:

Thank you for that information. It raises a question that maybe the pianists here can answer. I've just begun going through some selected excersizes by Czerny (Germer arranged the order of the excersizes) published by Alfred. Will this be helpful to em or am I wasting my time on it? (I rather suspect that any form of excersize as opposed to none would be helpful.) I am also working on Hanon. And how helpful would these excersizes be in working on Beethoven Sonatas?

I really believe that you have to be selective with studies - time alone dictates this and it is not necessary to plough through hundreds of exercises - I do only a few from Hanon and Cramer. I do however practice scales and arpeggios religously.

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'Man know thyself'

[Peter]

Originally posted by lysander:

I think we can learn a lot about great people tangentially as it were, through their relationship with other people in their life. I think this can well be true of Beethoven's relationship with the great child prodigy Carl Czerny.
Carl played the piano at the age of three, and was composing at seven. So phenominal was his musical memory that at the age of ten he could play by heart most of the works of Mozart and Clementi.
Beethoven captivated by his playing that he accepted Carl as a pupil. But obviously, Beethoven's terrific work commitments meant that he had to cancel lessons at short notice, and Carl's father took this as a personal affront to his maginficently gifted son, the lessons were dicontinued for some time.
Czenry's incredible industry produced nearly a thousand published compositions in all forms. His many other piano arrangements of Beethoven's works included the nine symphonies, six of the overtures,the septet, the Mass in C major, and the 'Archduke Trio. His writings on Beethoven and his piano music are invaluable.
I suppose we could say that Czerny never quite lived up to his early promise and that perhaps understandably he always felt to be in the artistic shadow of Beethoven.
He obviously acknowledged his debt to Beethoven in his many adaptions of his music, but Czerny's was not really a great and original musical talent. And is really one of the great musical technicians rather than pioneers. Beethoven I feel would have been touched by Czerny's acknowledgement of his music, but a little disappointed that this great prodigy had not gone on to greater new things, but there again there can only be one Beethoven and there can only be one Mozart who were prodigies and went on to fulfill their promise.
What I would like to ask is whether it is true that Beehoven had an aversion to giving lessons to child prodigies.

Czerny was a great cat lover and had plenty of them, so that endears him to me immediately! I think he was a great success and a very decent human being and this link may be of further interest -
http://classicalmus.hispeed.com/czerny/

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'Man know thyself'

[urtextmeister]

Thanks for the link, Peter. That is more than I thought I would ever know about Czerny. It seems to me that, depending on whether he liked someone, Beethoven could be very kind or very nasty. In the case of Czerny, he must have taken a shine to the boy. He evidently trusted him to perform his (Beethoven's) works in public. I can imagine how things might go, however, if the student did not practice or did not have much talent.
From my reading so far, I take it that Beethoven was well disposed towards young people. He obviously took a great interest in Karl and did quite a bit of teaching (probably in large part for financial reasons.) I'm sure he would have no patience for a wunderkind who was all flash, but I don't think Czerny was like that.
Sorrano,
Go easy on the Czerny. I have always taken the approach that it is better to spend time working on a difficult passage within a great piece that you actually want to play, than wasting time on boring etudes. However, Czerny etudes are some of the better ones. They are musical and fun and prepare one for the playing of classical repertoire.
Stay away from Hanon! What's the point of mindlessly dragging your fingers across the keys in patterns that will probably never occur in real music?
At the ripe of age of forty, I have come to the realization that almost all practicing should be a mental exercise and anything that we do because it is "good for our fingers" is a waste of time.

[Chris]

Originally posted by Sorrano:
I've just begun going through some selected excersizes by Czerny (Germer arranged the order of the excersizes) published by Alfred. Will this be helpful to em or am I wasting my time on it? (I rather suspect that any form of excersize as opposed to none would be helpful.) I am also working on Hanon. And how helpful would these excersizes be in working on Beethoven Sonatas?

Peter's much more the expert than I, but speaking for myself, I don't find Czerny's exercises to be that helpful. I do find Hanon very helpful, though. When I had the time, I went through all of them every day. But in the absense of that much time, I play a lot of scales and arpeggios.

[urtextmeister]

Piano technique can be a fairly subjective thing. We all approach it differently depending on our physical and mental approach to the instrument. Look at how Horowitz used to play, for instance. Almost no one could play like that except him. Glenn Gould looked like he must have been very uncomfortable, but it worked for him.
I have found scales and arpeggios to be useful because if I run across a scale in actual rep., my fingers automatically know what to do with it. Plus it helps with one's knowledge of keys. I would advocate etudes if they target a certain aspect of playing--double thirds, octaves, etc. Hanon gets one's fingers moving but that is about it in my opinion.
Anyway, it sounds like Czerny composed a lot of music besides etudes. Where is it all? I can honestly say I have never heard any concert music by Czerny in my lifetime. The article recommended by Peter almost implies that it has all vanished.

[Sorrano]

All your comments in regards to Czerny's and Hanon's exersizes are appreciated. I've determined to keep doing as I've been doing, playing a little of each as warm up but I will add scales and arrpeggios. I see the use of these more so than the exersizes; the exercizes often help strengthen fingers in preparation for certain types of patterns, such as trills. In that I find the exersizes very useful.

[Peter]

Originally posted by Sorrano:
All your comments in regards to Czerny's and Hanon's exersizes are appreciated. I've determined to keep doing as I've been doing, playing a little of each as warm up but I will add scales and arrpeggios. I see the use of these more so than the exersizes; the exercizes often help strengthen fingers in preparation for certain types of patterns, such as trills. In that I find the exersizes very useful.

Well yes - using the exercises for specific purposes is the best idea, such as developing trills - there are several trill exercises in Hanon which I use.



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'Man know thyself'

[Joy]

I like to do scales and arpeggios myself until fracturing my hand I no longer can do my exercises and I do miss practicing.

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'Truth and beauty joined'

[John Rasmussen]

If I were playing for a living, or otherwise playing a lot, I would certainly do exercises. As it is, my classical playing is mostly for my own edification, so I feel no need to do exercises except those which occur in the music I'm actually playing. (I do play hymns and praise songs for my church, but that's nothing.)

[Sorrano]

Originally posted by Peter:
Well yes - using the exercises for specific purposes is the best idea, such as developing trills - there are several trill exercises in Hanon which I use.

I am finding, too, in answer to my own question that when I play through Hanon I can see very cleary some of the weaknesses that I have between fingers. It gives me something to concentrate on.