| Description |
Part I: The writer performed Beethoven's Piano Concerto #1 on June 6, 1992 with the University of Utah Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Professor Robert Debbaut at Kingsbury Hall at 8 p.m. The performance and this paper in part satisfy the requirements for the Honors Degree of Bachelor of Music at the University of Utah. Part II: Artur Schnabel was one of the most famous piano pedagogues of the twentieth century. The author is a part of the Schnabel lineage, and Schnabel has had a profound impact on the writer's study of music, especially the music of Beethoven. Schnabel himself was a student of the great Theodore Leschetizky, one of two giants in the world of piano teaching in the nineteenth century, the other being Franz Liszt. Mr. Leschetizky studied with Carl Czerny, who studied with Ludwig van Beethoven himself. The author is a pupil of Gladys Gladstone, Professor of Music at the University of Utah from 1955 to the present, and a one time student of Schnabel. The writer has learned an approach to the interpretation of piano music, the music of Beethoven especially, whose music was "better than it could be played" according to Schnabel. This paper gives a brief biographical history of the life of Schnabel, and discusses aspects of his personality. It outlines his philosophical and practical principles of teaching, and aspects of his life as a performer and an artist. The paper then discusses the interpretive processes used by the author with respect to the performance of Beethoven's Piano Concerto #1 in C Major Ope 15 mentioned above. Finally, the writer makes observations from a study of Schnabel's recordings, and outlines the personal application of Schnabel's principles. |
