quote:

Originally posted by Piano*Dad:
Is there any documentary evidence that composers like Rachmaninoff wrote what they did deliberately to advantage big-handed pianists? And I don't mean just themselves, i.e. Rach writing the opening chords to the 2nd piano concerto just because he noodled around and it worked just fine for him.

You forgot the part about it being a conspiracy.

It doesn't seem like a conspiracy, which seems like an odd way to look at it to me. People tend to write what's in their wheelhouse. Someone who could reach a ninth would have to be consciously thinking, as Ax did, "I don't go over a sixth or an octave or whatever," if their intent was to make it playable by others.

I think that, at an elite level, being able to do something difficult is sometimes privileged at the expense of the music. I'm not really talking about the "big hands" thing. I'm thinking about music that's played really, really fast, when it might be more lyrical at a slower speed, but it's played fast because the ability to do so is one way to say that one player is better than another.

I suppose that there could be an element of this in big-hand pieces, if one were to arbitrarily say that someone with hands that are too small to play Rachmaninoff as written could never be a great pianist.

I haven't listened to the end of the podcast yet (I've listened to about half)...

All other issues aside, I just would really love to try one of these keyboards.

quote:

Originally posted by ShiroKuro:
I haven't listened to the end of the podcast yet (I've listened to about half)...

All other issues aside, I just would really love to try one of these keyboards.

I think smaller keyboards are more common in electric pianos and synthesizers. You might try one of those for a start.

I've read about a couple of the universities that have smaller keyboards options for a few of the pianos - it means they have a second action that can be swapped out if needed.

I've never worked with one - does the space between the sharps get narrowed too? That could cause some issues for folks with thicker fingers...

In contemporary classical music, there are definitely composers who deliberately push the envelope. Some with intricate rhythmic subdivisions, some with crazy leaps, etc., but also huge chords.

What one composer has told me is that they do this just to see how the pianist decides what to do with it. Iannis Xenakis is one for writing unplayable chords.

I’m working on a George Lewis piece with chords for huge hands. Some will get rolled or have notes left out.