This new volume in Schirmer's Library of Musical Classics brings together Books I and II of Bach's classic repertoire at an affordable price.
Book Description
Frequently Bought Together
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Don't let arrogant reviewers keep you from this masterpiece,
This review is from: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Complete: Schirmer Library of Musical Classics, Volume 2057 (Schirmer's Library of Musical Classics) (Paperback)
The previous reviewers have stated they dislike the Czerny additions to phrasing, dynamics, tempo, etc. As a life-long pianist, one thing I cannot stand is musicians such as the first two reviewers who attempt to taint an edition with their arrogant views. This is a great edition and I welcome Czerny's notes. He was Beethoven's student as well as Liszt's teacher. These fellows were closer to Bach than anyone alive today who thinks they know better. I've taken every Bach piece I've ever played and added my own feel to it. As long as you don't change the notes, it's not a crime. It's expression. I play the piano, not the harpsichord. I am great-full a master like Czerny put his thoughts into these timeless pieces.
Classical music and the musicians of today disgust me most of the time with their arrogant, "It HAS to be THIS WAY" outlook. I'm sure if someone traveled back in time and actually met Bach, he probably wouldn't be opposed to self-expression. Neither would Czerny...Liszt....et al. They were masters at it. Bach only sounds better in their hands and now we have a chance to learn from a fine interpretation...regardless of how it's labeled. If you just can't sleep at night because you don't like the "suggestions" Czerny made....Ignore them..just read the notes....be a robot....it's your right.
17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
YES! -- Now you, too, can play Bach like Beethoven,
This review is from: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Complete: Schirmer Library of Musical Classics, Volume 2057 (Schirmer's Library of Musical Classics) (Paperback)
This is a travesty.
In his opening introduction, Czerny writes that "We have indicated the time and style (1) from a consideration of the unmistakable character of each movement (2) from a vivid recollection of the manner in which we have heard many of the fugues played by the great Beethoven; and (3) lastly, by profiting from the ideas that we have gained during more than 30 years' patient study of this incomparable work. All three of these topics would be excellently contained in a book, where Czerny could justify what he saw as the "unmistakable" character of the work (not so unmistakable to this pianist...), could describe the way Beethoven played these fugues, and could expound upon the ideas gained during his 30+ years of study. One might not agree with every statement contained therein, but one could at least profit from the explanations. But instead of offering us such a book, Czerny elects to dictatorially place in tempo, phrasing, and dynamic markings with not even a single footnote by way of explanation. With the dynamics, one at least can be certain that these are Czerny's own additions, and can ignore them to a large degree; not so with the tempo and phrasing. Bach did occasionally put in his own tempo and phrasing markings, and we have no way in this edition to discern between whether such markings are Bach's own or Czerny's (though a modifier in tempo markings -- eg, maestoso -- is a fair clue that Czerny is the culprit). As for the dynamics -- I love Bach played on the piano, and I am not opposed to the use of dynamics in Bach per se. However, these are choices best left to the imagination of the performer, not to the dictation of Czerny, or even Beethoven via Czerny. Even if one attempts to ignore Czerny's dynamic markings, they almost inevitably seep into one's playing; moreover, after one has been assiduously ignoring dynamic markings, it is hard to get back into the habit of not ignoring them when one plays pieces where the composer has notated dynamics. With all Czerny's excess markings, this should really be sold as Czerny's pianistic transcription of the WTC, not as an edition. In addition to the aforementioned problems, there are numerous notational inaccuracies. To be fair, this is not really Czerny's fault -- since this is such an old addition and did not benefit from the discovery of subsequent manuscripts, such errors are to be expected -- but it is still another blemish on this already awful manuscript. I cannot even in good conscience list its cheapness as a positive attribute, because on closer inspection this becomes yet another negative aspect of the work; it leads unsuspecting students (like myself) to buy this awful addition for pecuniary reasons. Chances are when the student realizes how wretched it is, he will (like me) be compelled to go out and buy a new one anyway, and will have ended up spending more than he would have if he had bought a good edition in the first place. I cannot recommend NOT buying this edition enough. An excellent edition, different from the Czerny in all the best ways, is the Bärenreiter Urtext, which is clear and comprehensive and allows this musician to see Bach's own progress on these fugues by presenting various changes in different manuscripts (changes which generally tended towards greater rhythmic and harmonic complexity). Really, though, any other WTC edition has to be better than this one. A minor side note -- I notice that Schirmer has changed the title of this edition to its correct title ("Well Tempered Clavier"). Perplexingly, as recently as 10 years ago it was sold under the inaccurate title "Well Tempered Clavichord."
5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Misleading edition of WTC,
By Charles Duckett (Middle Tennessee) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Well-Tempered Clavier, Complete: Schirmer Library of Musical Classics, Volume 2057 (Schirmer's Library of Musical Classics) (Paperback)
I've been reading through this Schirmer edition of the WTC for a couple of weeks; I'm now about halfway through book II. I'll continue on to the end, despite my dislike for the edition, because it's the only one I have at present.
The previous reviewer Etha thoroughly trashed this edition and I agree with all her comments. These are arrangements for piano, in the manner of a transcription. As I use a (digital) harpsichord to read 18th C. music, I don't mind the spurious dynamics etc. too much. But what lead me to look at these reviews was a feeling that the ornaments were wrong, changed, edited, or something. I'll definitely be getting a different edition for future use once I finish reading through this one. Probably try the Dover. This edition could be useful to a teacher who has unsophisticated students who want to play Bach on the piano. Following Czerny's arrangements could help such a student avoid the typical robot-style performance of Bach on piano that results from seeing none of the usual pianistic markings. Of course, this is a landmark super-masterwork; impossible to f%$* it up too much.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Listmania!
So You'd Like to...
|
|
