Talk:Piano concerto

Untitled

To 67.176.193.252 — please explain your last two edits, I cannot see any reason to remove the link to [[de:Klavierkonzert]] in particular. Schissel : bowl listen 02:02, Mar 20, 2005 (UTC)

Other concertante pieces for piano

Following the example set by the creators of the cello equivalent of this wikipedia article, I've decided to open up a new section to list works for piano and orchestra which are not considered concertos. These works (rhapsodies, fantasies, konzertstucke, etc.) often borrow heavily from the fundamental elements found in the concerto but also embark upon musical adventures and introduce innovations which feed back into the evolution of the concerto form (single movement pieces influenced by the fast-slow-fast sonata form of the traditional concerto; concerto movements played attaca which segue seemlessly into each other in unbroken musical narrative; rise of the single-movement piano concerto during the Romantic period; concerto movements explore themes and variations to keep musical ideas rolling rather than repeating previous material, etc). (If you are reading this, I hope you can sort of make out my meaning, since my musical training is far from being polished and from progressing beyond the primitive). The addition I'm proposing will probably place the article at risk of turning into a lengthy monstrosity (if it isn't one already), so that it may be better to assign the other concertante works to a separate annex or article. Nevertheless, many of these compositions (Rhapsody in Blue, Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini to name two) are living landmarks in Western music that deserve their own category in wikipedia. Defrosted 08:10, 25 Mar 2005

The list of concertos

I'm quite new to Wikipedia, and don't want to "tread on people's toes" by just moving information around...

I think that the list of piano concertos sits uncomforably in the piano concertos entry. Some prominent well-known examples in the text would be useful to illustrate the concept and historical development of piano concerto and send the curious off exploring, but does a simple list achieve anything of the sort? Does nPOV imply that every piano concerto ever written should be in the list, whatever its musical worth? The logical conclusion of that is that the target is for every piano concerto ever written to be in the list! That's not going to help someone who wants to find out about piano concertos!

Also it's not always clear whether a work qualifies as a piano concerto. Obviously it often is clear (works published under the title piano concerto, for instance!), but there's not a clear divide. What about Alkan's two little Concerti da camera and Schelling's Suite Fantastique? Do works where the pianist is centre stage for long periods (examples that spring to mind are Stravinsky's Petrushka, Messiaen's Des canyons aux étoiles..., Szymanowski's 4th symphony) count as piano concertos, or are they concertante works - or neither?! What's their place on the list? This difficulty has already been acknowledged by the addition of a "selected list of other concertante works".

May I suggest that all these issues would be solved if the list was simply moved bodily to a new List of compositions for piano and orchestra page, with a "see also" link to it from here? This will both tighten the scope of this page, and expand the scope of the list. I'll do it if there's agreement! --RobertG 14:58, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Arguably likewise for Violoncello concerto, Violin concerto and Viola concerto; some more space given the history and balance problems of the respective genres might be a better use of the space (since I am not qualified to write on those subjects but do have some knowledge of what works have been written, I wrote lists instead, that is...) Schissel : bowl listen 20:09, Apr 13, 2005 (UTC)

Actual Concertos

I know for violin, the paginini concertos are considered to be the hardest. What are the hardest concertos for piano?- EK —The preceding unsigned comment was added by EKN (talk • contribs) 21 January 2006.

Yes, the Paganini are hard, but I don't find them the most rewarding listening (I'd rather listen to "real" Rossini rather than mock Rossini!). My point is that supreme virtuosity and musicality brought to any concerto, even the technically undemanding, will tend to make the performance a thing of beauty and wonder, and you miss so much listening out for "difficulty". That said, only a top virtuoso would even consider tackling, say, Rachmaninoff's 3rd, Prokofiev's 2nd, Henselt's, Scharwenka's 4th, Marx's Romantic concerto, Reger's, Ligeti's, or Des canyons aux etoiles… by Messiaen (…tackling them in public, anyway). I've certainly missed many off that list. Not technically a "piano concerto", Alkan's Concerto for solo piano op. 39 nos. 4-6 sets formidable challenges, and requires the pianist to additionally be the orchestra during the tuttis. However this is all my opinion and must not find its way into the article. --RobertG ♬ talk 11:05, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

To be picky (very) the Alkan solo concerto is op 39 nos. 8-10, and is a concerto on the analogy of the Bach Italian, indeed. (4-7 are a "symphony" along the same lines.) Haven't heard Sorabji's piano-orchestra concertos- only one has I think been performed and broadcast- but imagine their difficulty is probably way up there also. Schissel | Sound the Note! 13:20, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Graham

Some anonymous IP is advertising John Kenneth Graham's piano concerto here. Possibly Mr Graham himself, as the same IP had made edits to the Graham entry. Mr Graham's piano concerto is not notable repertoire, and it should certainly not stand as an example of anything here. I have accordingly reverted. CRCulver 23:04, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Oops, looks like someone beat me to it. CRCulver 23:04, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Mozart's concertos

It is surely a bit misleading to say that the classical period concertos are in "sonata form" - Mozart's carefully avoid this symphonic form, and more or less so does Beethoven when he realised what Mozart's structure really was... Grahbudd 20:41, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

"Notable" concertos

I removed a list of "notable concertos". I don't think we should presume to select such a list, unless someone can do a survey of several expertly-researched lists, like the Opera project did. This is quite apart from the fact that the proposed list only included 11 examples, only two by Mozart, and omitted Schumann, Chopin, Brahms 1, Rachmaninoff 2, Beethoven 1-4, Henselt, Saint-Saens, Gershwin, Shostakovich, Britten, Tippett, Lutoslawski... --RobertG ♬ talk 16:58, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Concertos or concerti

The Manual of style's been changed since last I checked- it used to insist on concertos rather than concerti. Now it just insists on consistency within an article. Got it. Schissel | Sound the Note! 13:17, 11 August 2009 (UTC)

Anacoleuthon "Keyboard instrument is the organ concerto written by George Friedrich Handel was started in 1707 to be written after Johann Sebastian Bach concertos were used throughout the Baroque concerto for harpsichord, " What can this possibly mean? If the original author can fix it, great. If not it would be best deleted or replaced. Tishtosh20 (talk) 17:06, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

History

The history section is less than bare bones; it only mentions some late romantic and twentieth-century pieces, with no clear reason. I hope someone can replace it with a history that starts at the beginning and tells something about the development of the type. Zaslav (talk) 05:48, 27 January 2018 (UTC)