Methodical message polyphony. Methodological report “Work on the polyphony of I.S.

Municipal budgetary educational institution of additional education for children of the Khanty-Mansiysk region

"Children's music school"

« Work on polyphony in elementary grades"

Methodical message.

Petrenko Tamara Grigorievna

class teacher

piano, first

Gornopravdinsk village 2013

Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………3

Working on polyphonic processing folk songs

(N. Myaskovsky, S. Maykapar, Yu. Shchurovsky)………………………5

A detailed analysis of the work on J. S. Bach’s “Little Preludes”

and fugues"………………………………………………………………………………...9

Work on imitative polyphony - inventions, fuguettes, small fugues………………………………………………………13

Conclusion……………………………………………………………......16

References…………………………………………………….17

Introduction.

Relevance of the topic: Work on polyphony is one of the most difficult areas of education and training of students. The study of polyphonic music not only activates one of the most important aspects of the perception of musical fabric - its versatility, but also successfully influences the overall musical development student, because the student comes into contact with elements of polyphony in many works of a homophonic-harmonic nature.

« Polyphony" is a mandatory attribute of educational programs in the specialty "piano" at all levels of education: from children's music school to university. Therefore, today, the topic is relevant in matters of the formation of a modern musician-performer.

The purpose of my work is to show the basic methods of working on polyphonic works in elementary grades using examples of works.

The tasks are to help the performer determine the melodic lines of the voices, the meaning of each, hear their relationship and find means of performance that create differentiation of voices and diversity of their sound.

When considering the topic of polyphony, we should not forget about other areas of its existence. In polyphonic literature, a large role is given to two-voice works of large form. In plays of small forms, especially of a cantilena nature, the three-plane texture is more fully used, combining melody and harmony. More serious attention is paid to ensemble playing and sight reading.

In the process of musical, auditory and technical development of a student in grades 3-4, new qualities especially appear that are associated with the enrichment of previously acquired knowledge and the tasks that arise during this period of training. Compared to grades 1-2, the genre and stylistic boundaries of the program repertoire are noticeably expanding.

Great importance is attached to performing skills associated with mastery of intonation, tempo-rhythm, mode-harmonic and articulatory expressiveness. The use of dynamic nuances and pedaling is significantly expanding. New, more complex techniques of fine technique and elements of chord-interval presentation appear in the piano texture of the works. By the end of this period of training, differences in the level of development of students’ musical-auditory and piano-motor abilities become noticeable. This allows us to predict the possibilities of their further general musical,

professional and performance training. The student’s artistic and pedagogical repertoire includes piano music from different eras and styles. Compared to the two initial years of study, in grades 3-4, the specifics of developing musical thinking and performance skills when studying different types of piano literature are clearly revealed.

1. Work on polyphonic arrangements of folk songs

(N. Myaskovsky, S. Maykapar, Yu. Shchurovsky).

The musical development of a child involves developing the ability to hear and perceive as separate elements of the piano tissue, i.e. horizontal and a single whole – vertical. In this sense, great educational importance is attached to polyphonic music. The student becomes familiar with the elements of subvocal, contrastive and imitative polyphony from the first grade of school. These types of polyphonic music in the repertoire of grades 3-4 do not always appear in an independent form. We often find in children's literature combinations of contrasting vocalization with subvocal or imitative vocalization. Special role belongs to the study of cantilena polyphony. The school program includes: polyphonic arrangements for piano of folk lyrical songs, simple cantilena works by I. Bach and Soviet composers (N. Myaskovsky, S. Maikapar, Yu. Shchurovsky). They contribute to the student’s better listening to voice performance and evoke a strong emotional reaction to music.

Let us analyze individual examples of polyphonic arrangements of Russian musical folklore, noting their significance in the musical and pianistic education of a child. Let's take for example the following plays: “Podblyudnaya” by A. Lyadov, “Kuma” by An. Aleksandrova, “You are a garden” by Slonim. All of them are written in verse-variation form. When repeated, melodious melodies “overgrow” with echoes, “choral” chord accompaniment, plucked folk instrumental background, and colorful shifts into different registers.

Arrangements of folk songs play an important role in the polyphonic education of a student. An excellent example of a light adaptation of a Russian folk song is “Kuma” by An. Alexandrova:

The play has 3 sections, like 3 verses of a song. In each of them, one of the voices carries out a constant song tune. Other voices have the character of echoes; they enrich the melody and reveal new features in it. When starting to work on a piece, you must first introduce the student to the song itself, performing it on the instrument. A figurative representation of the content helps to understand the musical development of the play and the expressive meaning of polyphony in each of the three “verses.” The first “verse” seems to reproduce the image of Kuma, sedately starting a conversation with Kum. Subvoices in the lower register are distinguished by smoothness, regularity and even a certain “decency” of movement. They must be performed slowly, with a soft, deep sound, achieving maximumlegato. When working on the first “verse”, it is useful to draw the student’s attention to the characteristic modal variability, emphasizing the folk-national basis of the play.

The second “verse” is significantly different from the first. The theme moves into the lower voice and takes on a masculine tone; she is echoed by a cheerful and ringing upper voice. The rhythmic movement becomes more animated, the mode becomes major. In this cheerful “duet of Kuma and Kuma” it is necessary to achieve the relief sound of the extreme voices. Great benefit can come from their simultaneous performance by the student and the teacher - one plays for “Kuma” and the other for “Kuma”. The final “verse” is the most cheerful and lively. The movement of eighths now becomes continuous. The lower voice plays a particularly important expressive role in changing the character of the music. It is written in the spirit of typical folk instrumental accompaniments, widespread in Russian musical literature. The playful and playful nature of the music is emphasized by the imitations of voices skillfully woven into the fabric of the piece. The final “verse” is the most difficult to perform polyphonically. In addition to the combination in the part of one hand of two voices, different in rhythmic terms, which took place in the previous “verses”, here it is especially difficult to achieve a contrast between the parts of the two hands: the melodiouslegatoV right hand and lungstaccato in the left hand.

Usually the student is not immediately able to perform forced roll calls of voices. Study of "Kuma" by An. Alexandrova is useful in many ways. In addition to developing polyphonic thinking and skills in performing various combinations of contrasting voices, the play provides an opportunity to work on a melodious song melody and get acquainted with some of the stylistic features of Russian folk music.

Below we give examples of plays in which the student acquires the skills of cantilena polyphonic playing, mastery of episodic two-voices in the part separate hand, contrasting strokes, hearing and feeling the holistic development of the entire form. We find the combination of subvocal tissue with imitations in Ukrainian folk songs arranged for piano by I. Berkovich, arranged by N. Lysenko, N. Leontovich.

His plays became established in the school repertoire: "That's dumb i "That's dumb rsh n

to whom""That's dumb»

“Oh, because of the fire of Kam’yano

"Plive Choven" "That's dumb"Noise "That's dumb la l

little girl"

In which the verse structure is enriched not only with imitations, but also with a denser chord-choral texture. The student comes into contact with contrasting voice leading mainly when studying the polyphonic works of J. S. Bach. First of all, these are pieces from the Notebook of Anna Magdalena Bach. II

. A detailed analysis of the work on J. S. Bach’s “Little Preludes”

J. S. Bach "Little Prelude" A minor (first notebook).

In general, the intended interpretation of the topic sounds like this:

The further development of the polyphonic fabric is characterized by the repeated implementation of the theme in the lower and upper voices in the key of the dominant.

The prelude is written in the character of a two-part fuguetta. In the two-bar theme that opens it, two emotional images are felt. The main, longer part (ending with the A sound of the first octave) consists of a continuous “rotational” movement of three-tone melodic units, each of which is built on a gradual expansion of the volume of intervallic “steps”. This development of the melodic line necessitates expressive intonation of ever-increasing tension from smaller to larger intervals while preserving exclusively melodiouslegato. In a short conclusion to the theme, starting with sixteenth notes. It is necessary to note intonationally the tritone turn (A-D #) followed by a decline in sound.

Conducting a response (lower voice) requires greater dynamic saturation (mf). The counterposition, rhythmically similar to the theme, is shaded by different dynamics (mp) and a new touch (menolegato). After a four-bar interlude, the theme reappears in the main key, sounding especially full when intonating the major turn towards C-sharp. The three-bar coda consists of recitatively pronounced single-voice lines in sixteenth notes, ending with a final codan. The Prelude is an excellent example of Bach's imitative polyphony. Mastering the structural and expressive features of her voice preparation prepares the young pianist for further study of the more developed polyphonic fabric in inventions and fugues.

I.S. Bach "Little Prelude" in C minor (first notebook).

The performance of this prelude by students is usually characterized by a desire for speed and toccatism; its rhythmically similar texture often sounds monotonous due to children’s unclear ideas about the form, logic and beauty of harmonic and mode-tonal connections. This often interferes with the rapid memorization of music.

A detailed analysis of the prelude allows you to hear three clearly emerging parts in it: 16 + 16 + 11 bars. Each of them reveals its own characteristics of harmonious development, predicting the principles of interpretation of the whole and parts. In the first part they

appear first in the form of a harmonic community of both voices in two measures (bars 1-2, 3-4,5-6). Further (bars 7-10), the functional stability of the upper voice is combined with the identification of the molar beats of the gradually descending line of the bass voice (sounds C, B flat, A flat, G). Towards the end of the movement there is a purer change of harmonies. Given the relative stability of the harmonic fabric, everything is performed on the piano, with only an occasional shading of the line of the bass voice towards the end of the movement.

In the middle part, the climax is achieved through means of harmony. Here, with almost complete preservation of the sounds of the bass (organ) “D” part of the right hand, continuous bar-by-bar changes of function occur. In conditions of general emotional tension, the figurations themselves sound melodically rich. At the same time, the upper sounds are heard in them,

resembling the line of an independent voice (F sharp, G, A becar, B flat, C, B flat, A becar, G, F sharp, E becar, E flat, D). According to the identification of the hidden voice in the right hand part, a wave-like melodic movement is felt in the right notes of the up-beat figures of the lower voice.

In the final part of the prelude, the harmonic tension subsides and the melodic figuration leads to a final bright G major chord. Having revealed the figurative content of the prelude, we will try to analyze the techniques of its execution. Initial

The fourth note of each measure in the left hand is played by plunging it deeply into the keyboard. The figure in the right hand, entering after a pause, is performed by lightly touching the keyboard with the first finger, followed by the support of the third or second on the initial sounds of the second quarter bars. At the same time, accurately removing the left hand during a pause makes it possible to hear it clearly. The alternation of hands in figurations of sixteenth notes on the third quarters of measures occurs when they barely noticeably fall on the keys in the receptionnonlegato. The recommended pianistic techniques will undoubtedly help in achieving rhythmic accuracy and evenness of sound. In the most dynamically rich middle part of the prelude, a short pedal marks out bass sounds, especially in places where the hand parts are written in a wide register arrangement. Once again I would like to emphasize the need for students to understand the logic of harmonic development when perceiving the musical fabric of the prelude.

III . Work on imitative polyphony - inventions, fuguettes, small fugues.

imagery. Even when working on the lightest examples of such music, auditory analysis is aimed at revealing both the structural and expressive aspects of the thematic material. After the teacher has performed the work, it is necessary to move on to a painstaking analysis of the polyphonic material. Having divided the play into large sections (most often based on a three-part structure), one should begin to explain the musical and semantic syntactic essence of the theme and the counterposition in each section, as well as interludes. First, the student must determine the layout of the topic and feel its character. Then his task is to expressively intonate it using means of articulatory dynamic coloring at the found basic tempo. The same applies to opposition if it is of a restrained nature. Already in two-voice small preludes, fuguettes, inventions, the expressive features of the strokes should be considered horizontally (i.e. in the melodic line) and vertically (i.e. with the simultaneous movement of a number of voices). The most characteristic horizons in articulation may be the following: smaller intervals tend to merge, larger intervals tend to separate; moving metrics (for example, sixteenth and eighth notes) also tend to merge, and calmer ones (for example, quarter, half, whole notes - towards dismemberment).

Yu. Shchurovsky “Invention” C - dur .

In “Invention” by Yu. Shchurovsky, all sixteenth notes, set out in smooth, often scale-like progressions, are performedlegato, longer sounds with their wide intervallic “steps” are divided into short leagues, staccato sounds ortenuto. If the theme is based on chord sounds, it is useful for the student to play its harmonic skeleton with chords, directing his auditory attention to the natural change of harmonies as he moves to a new section. To more actively listen to the student’s two-voice fabric, his attention should be drawn to the technique of the opposite movement of voices, for example, in the “invention” of A. Gedicke.

A. Gedicke “Invention”F- dur.

N. Myaskovsky “Hunting Call”.

Methodological association.

To begin with, I would like to explain why I decided to take on this particular topic. The fact is that we, teachers, often explain the same concepts to children, but use different terminology. And therefore, a child cannot always understand that what is being explained to him in a specialty lesson is exactly what he just recently went through in a musical literature lesson. I immediately want to stipulate that I do not insist on your use of the terminology I proposed, and certainly do not want to lecture you, since we are all highly educated people here with teaching experience behind us.

Now I would like to tell you a little about programs in musical literature. The fact is that there are two programs: the E.B. program. Lisyanskaya, in which works are studied according to genre, and the traditional program of A. Lagutin, according to which we all studied. At our school, children study according to A. Lagutin’s program, because it makes it possible to understand specific phenomena artistic creativity, get acquainted with biographies and creative heritage great composers and at the same time see the interconnection of eras and styles, imagine the process of development of musical art, the change of artistic directions. So, at what period of education do children first become acquainted with polyphony? This happens in the second year of studying musical literature, in the fifth grade of a seven-year study, and in grades 3 to 5.

1. Historical background.

I would not like to burden you with dry terminology. I decided to go the following way. I would like to offer you the history of the emergence of polyphony in the same way as I tell it to children, but in a truncated version more adapted for you with short musical fragments.

So, before studying the work of I.S. Bach, in which the polyphonic style is fully represented, we study the emergence of polyphony and polyphonic genres from the Middle Ages to the Baroque era.

I would like to suggest that you first arrange the eras proposed on the board in chronological order:

Romanticism

1. Renaissance

   Classicism

   Renaissance

   Middle Ages

   Antiquity

Now try to identify the genres that belong to the first four eras:

4. Gregorian chant

6. Cantata

7. Oratorio

8. Passions

9. Madrigal

11.Organum

1. Antiquity Musical material is not available to us.

2. Middle Ages Gregorian chant, Organum, Song.

3. Revival of Chanson, Madrigal, Mass.

4. Baroque Cantata, Oratorio, Mass, Passions, Opera.

Well, now I would like to voice some points, so that it is clear to you with what theoretical and musical baggage your children approach the study of inventions and fugues. The duration of the fragments is 10-12 seconds, so as not to take up much time.

Gregorian chant.

The style of Catholic church music developed in Western Europe in the 6th century. ad. The main centers of its occurrence are Italy, France, Spain.

The inspired melodies of the Gregorian chant were passed on from mouth to mouth, at that time musical notation did not yet exist.

Over the course of 3 centuries, many learned monks and musically educated representatives of the “white clergy” worked on a systematic collection of melodies of this style. The result was a vast codex of the early 7th century, in whose creation Pope Gregory 1 played a major role, hence the name "Gregorian chants".

By the 9th century Gregorian chant finally established itself on territories W-E and became the dominant element musical culture Middle Ages.

Gregorian chants were performed exclusively in Latin, by a male choir, monophonically in unison.

2.ORGANUM.
About 1000 years ago, the Gregorian chant found its companion, a second voice, at first this voice simply moved parallel to the first in a fourth fifth or octave in the same rhythm, then such musical forms were called organum.

It would seem that parallel two-voices do not fundamentally change the structure of the monody: the given melody is only thickened by one of the perfect consonances. However, according to contemporaries, such two-voices made a huge impression and were regarded as very harmonious singing, full of “captivity.” It was a qualitatively new sound, perceived as a miracle that opened up unexpected possibilities in the art of sounds. Considering that the basic voices could additionally be doubled, i.e., give 3 and 4 voices, supported by the acoustics of the cathedral space, resonating at pure intervals, it is easy to imagine what sound effects were produced by a primitive parallel organum.

3. Melismatic organum

But the number of voices gradually increased, there were 3-4 of them, the rhythmic pattern of each voice changed, and their relationship became freer. All this required musical notation. And in the 11th century. Italian monk, musician and scientist Guido Aretinsky invents modern notation. Since then, many musical works have been recorded and some of them have reached us.

For example, the melismatic organum, a fragment of which we will listen to.

4. Perotin Organum.

The highest achievement of early polyphony, works by composers working in the 12-13th centuries, in the Noterdam Cathedral in Paris. Leonin and his student Perotin composed not just more complex polyphonic works, but for the first time introduced music to listeners as an independent structure of art, from now on not only text, but also music directly and directly expressed the word of God.

5. Program music by Clément Genequin “Birdsong”.

By the 15th century, and this was already the Renaissance, home choral singing had become extremely widespread in Europe. The texts of secular songs of the Renaissance, motets, chansons, and later in the 16th century, madrigals were sounded in native language performers and listeners, in French and English, German and Italian. Polyphony, the so-called strict script, was distinguished by strict counterpoints and sophisticated imitations. She becomes more free, varied and expressive. And here in the chanson of the French composer of the 16th century. Clément Genequin's "Birdsong", we hear the cuckoo and bird roll calls. This is how it arises program music.

6. Palestrina “Agnus dei”.

And at this time in catholic church the Mass continues to dominate. We will now hear a fragment of the main last sixth section of the mass “Agnus dei”, from the mass of Pope Marcello by the famous Italian composer Palestrina. This is choral polyphony using one of the most popular principles for the development of polyphonic material of imitation.

The absolute dominance of vocal music ended with the Renaissance. And starting from the 17th century, they developed independent genres instrumental music. The new Baroque era posed new challenges for humanity, and it was instrumental music managed with a special philosophical power create generalized musical images filled with deep meaning. In the 17th century, organ art reached its highest peak. The main task of the organ in the church is to be the voice of a Christian believer turned to the Lord, therefore only highly educated organists were allowed to play the organ. One of the most wonderful German organists was I.S. Bach.

But today we will not talk about organ music Bach, but about his keyboard works. It is known for certain that I.S. Bach began composing his keyboard works during the Köthen period, when he worked as a court musician for the Prince of Köthen. This is evidenced by the text of the title page of the latest edition of the inventions: “Composed by I.S. Bach, Grand Duke of Anhalt-Köthen Kapellmeister. From the birth of Christ the year 1732.”

It was not by chance that I started talking about editors. The fact is that there were 3 editions of the inventions in total.

In 1720, the composer entered many of the inventions into the Notebook of his eldest son Wilhelm Friedemann, where the two-voice pieces, originally called preambles (preludes, introductions), were placed separately from the three-voice pieces, then called “fantasies.” .

The second edition was preserved only in a copy of one of Bach's students. The richly ornamented pieces in this version were arranged exclusively according to tonality: each three-voice invention was preceded by a two-voice one of the same key.

MUSICAL EXAMPLE.

In the third edition, Bach finally separated inventions and symphonies, returning to the original plan.

E flat major

G major

G minor

B flat major

Before explaining new concepts, it is necessary to tell children that works of the ancient polyphonic style are built on the disclosure of one artistic image, on multiple repetitions of the theme - that core, the development of which determines the form of the play.

It is important to pay attention to the fact that invention has, because the name invention comes from Lat. inventio – discovery, invention.

Olga Mikhailovna will now play this invention for us, and then we will begin to analyze it.

1. When starting to analyze the TOPIC of a C major invention, I give children the opportunity to independently determine the boundaries of the topic.

Olga Mikhailovna

2. Then we pay attention to a certain dialogue between the right and left hands and find the ANSWER, remember the concept IMITATION already known to us.

Olga Mikhailovna

4. Then we identify how many times the topic appears throughout the entire intervention.

5. Then, with the most advanced students, we prescribe the tonal plan.

6. Paying attention to the fact that there is some connecting material between the topics, we learn that it is called interlude.

Olga Mikhailovna

And the whole invention ends with a cadence, sometimes this is the carrying out of the theme in the main key.

Olga Mikhailovna

Also according to the program we go through the F major invention.

To the sounds of the 8th two-voice F-major invention, one can imagine a fun, mischievous game-competition, it seems as if elastic balls are bouncing and rolling. Following the initial introduction of the theme in the upper voice, the lower voice imitates not only the theme, but also its continuation - the counterposition, so for some time a continuous canonical imitation or canon arises.

Olga Mikhailovna plays the entire invention.

This innovation is not carried out by chance in the program; in it we are faced with new techniques of polyphonic development

CANONICAL IMITATION,

HELD CONTRADICTION.

As you already understand, we are going through these interventions according to the program. But there are imitative forms that you encounter when working with textbook ped. rep. These are FUGETTS.

So, we can confirm this table using the example of FOUGETTA by the composer Armand.

Olga Mikhailovna will play the fuguetta in full, and then in sections.

2. Clear regulation of work with the topic and in the construction of the form. That is, here we can clearly distinguish an exhibition, development and reprisal section.

3. Working with one main theme - more often this is a tonal movement, isolating the main intonation, reversing it, sequencing it.

4. The theme as a given remains unchanged in different parts of the form. Topic in initial form must appear in the final section of the form (it may be shortened).

5. The tonal movement can be of the fugue type (T-D-S-T).

The Well-Tempered Clavier is the result of many years of work by the composer, which lasted a quarter of a century. In 1722, in Köthen, Bach combined 24 preludes and fugues created at different times and gave the collection the title Well-Tempered Clavier Volume 1. 22 years later in Leipzig, the composer created a second cycle called “24 New Preludes and Fugues,” which over time began to be considered 2 part of HTC.

The number of plays was not accidental. Bach wrote for the clavier of a new modification. The keyboard of this instrument was divided into equal intervals - semitones, i.e., evenly tempered. The octave began to contain 12 equal semitones. This made it possible to form 12 major and 12 minor keys. Bach set himself the goal of practically proving that in an equal-tempered system all 24 tonalities have equal rights and sound equally good.

I.S. Bach HTC No. 1 Prelude and Fugue C-moll

The prelude is free and improvisational; the first of the two main sections of the prelude is filled with fast, steady movement of 16th notes, this perpetual movement is perpeto mobile. Having accumulated powerful energy, this flow at the end of the first section becomes even more rapid. The climax, the beginning of the second section, is marked by a change in tempo from allegro to presto, but the raging elements are stopped by sudden strikes of chords and meaningful phrases - recitatives in the tempo of Adagio. For the third time, the tempo changes to a moderately fast Allegro, but the tonic organ point in the bass slows down the movement of the 16th notes in the right hand and it peacefully freezes on a C major chord.

After a short two-bar interlude, built on the main melodic turn of the theme, it sounds for the third time - in the bass. The key is C minor.

The second push-pull interlude connects the exposition section with the development section. It begins in a bright E flat major, in a parallel key. The major color colors the music bright hues. The theme runs in different tones. Movement also intensifies in interludes.

With the return of the main key, the third reprise section of the fugue begins. The theme appears in the bass, which gives the sound a special meaning. The second conduction in the main key acquires such a powerful scope that it makes one recall the raging forces of the prelude, and just like in the prelude, the final conduction of the theme ends with an enlightened C major chord. The fact is that almost all of his works that Bach wrote in a minor key are completed in a major key. In the Baroque era, it was believed that major, unlike minor, sounds much more stable.

I would like to add that when studying preludes and fugues with more advanced students, do not be afraid to expose them to the complex content of Bach's music. After all, it’s no secret that both volumes of the HTC are a kind of Bach Bible, with their own motivic symbolism. Refer to Nosina’s book “Symbolism of Music by I.S. Bach." In this book, when analyzing the CTC, the methodology of the Russian musicologist, pianist and teacher Boleslav Yavorsky was used. Particular attention is paid to his concept of “HTK” as a generalized musical interpretation of the images and events of the Holy Scripture.

STROPHIC FORMS.

Music program school includes works of 3 main types of polyphony:

contrasting

Polyphonic works written in strophic form have the vocal nature of the musical material.

For example: A. Baltin In the choir (invention).

Olga Mikhailovna plays from beginning to end. Then stanza by stanza. (2 stanzas)

Also, these can be arrangements of songs of various peoples (Russian, Ukrainian, Georgian, etc.), or original material written in song folk style. Often such works are called a song, ditty, story, legend, etc. They may include individual elements of imitative polyphony, thus creating a mixed type of subvocal-imitative polyphony.

For example:

Ukrainian folk song. Arr. Berkovich.

Lyapunov Play.

In conclusion, I would like to say that it is important and necessary to instill a love for polyphonic works, because this is music that makes you think.

Application:

Romanticism

Renaissance

Classicism

Renaissance

Middle Ages

Antiquity

Methodical message

Teacher at Children's Music School No. 7

Skrebkova Kristina Yurievna

Illustrator, head of the piano department Olga Mikhailovna Kobelkova

Topic: “Interdisciplinary connections in the study of polyphonic works in a musical literature lesson.”

Introduction.

Comparative characteristics of E.B. programs Lisyanskaya and programs

A. Lagutina.

Historical reference.

The emergence and development of polyphonic genres. From Gregorian chant to the fugue. Musical examples (audio recording).

Imitation forms.

Three editions of J. S. Bach's inventions.

Cycle structure. Tonal plan.

- INVENTION.

THEME, RESPONSE, OPPOSITE, INTERMEDIA, CADENCE.

CANONICAL IMITATION,

HELD CONTRADICTION.

- FUGETTA.

The fact is that the question of the specifics of such polyphonic genres as invention and fuguette is the least studied in the musicological literature. In the music of modern composers, both of these genres are found quite often, but the question of their fundamental difference remains theoretically little explored. Based on practical observation of plays from the students’ educational repertoire, it is proposed comparison table genres of invention and fuguetta.

Confirmation of this table using the example of analysis of FOUGETTA by composer Arman.

- FUGA

I.S. Bach HTC vol. 1 Prelude and Fugue C – minor.

STROPHIC FORMS.

Strophic form. Vocal nature of musical material.

Musical example V. Baltin In the choir (invention).

Strophic forms with elements of imitations. Subvocal imitative polyphony.

Musical examples:

Ukrainian folk song arranged by Berkovich.

A. Lyapunov Play

CONCLUSION. CONCLUSIONS.

Review ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

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Methodical message

"Work on polyphony in the junior classes of children's music schools."

Teacher Kuznetsova N.M.

Shchelkovo-2011

Work on polyphony at Children's Music School

Folk music, especially the music of the Russian people, is always imbued with the spirit of ensemble, collectivity, and carries within itself the tradition of polyphony.

The melodic melodiousness of folk music is not monophonic in nature. She strives for collective intonation, to reveal herself through the choir, through polyphony. Classical music - in opera, in symphony, in chamber forms - has always provided high examples of rich and diverse polyphony, which has its origins in folk tradition. Polyphony, as an effective force in music, could not help but attract the creative attention of composers of various directions throughout the history of music. Composers have never been indifferent to polyphony. Learning polyphony is the key to mastering the art of piano playing. After all, piano music is all polyphonic in in a broad sense this word. To master the piano well, as Yuri Bogdanov said, you need to play etudes and works by J. S. Bach. Therefore, in the initial years of education in kindergarten music school it is necessary to cultivate interest and love for music, and therefore for polyphonic music.

The best guide to the world of music for a child is a song. It is this that enables the teacher to interest the student in music. A first-grader willingly sings familiar songs, listens with interest and guesses different character plays that the teacher plays for him (funny, sad, dance, solemn, etc.) Along the way, the child should be told that sounds, like words, convey content and different feelings. In the first lesson, I usually play a “game” with a student to determine the nature of music. First, I play him various pieces, where he must determine the mood conveyed by the composer, then I ask the student to determine the nature of the music by the title or by the picture, which clearly conveys the mood. Children especially like the plays from the collection “Getting to Know Music” by Artobolevskaya. For example, the play “Where are you, Leka”, based on the picture, children tell a whole story about why the dog is sad. Picture accompanying Minuet by J.S. Bach clearly conveys the era of that time, the costumes of those dancing at the ball. Based on children's stories, one can determine the child's horizons, his lexicon, sociability, etc. This is how musical impressions gradually accumulate. Melodies of children's and folk songs in the lightest single-voice transcriptions for piano are the most intelligible educational material for beginners in terms of content. Careful selection of repertoire is of great importance in a student's musical success. Songs should be chosen simple, but meaningful, distinguished by bright intonation expressiveness, with a clearly defined climax. Thus, from the first steps, the focus of the student’s attention becomes a melody, which he sings expressively, and then just as expressively tries to “sing” on the piano. The expressive and melodious performance of single-voice melodic songs is subsequently transferred to the combination of two of the same melodies in light polyphonic pieces. The naturalness of this transition is the key to maintaining a keen interest in polyphony in the future.

The polyphonic repertoire for beginners consists of light polyphonic arrangements of subvocal folk songs, close and understandable to children in their content. The teacher talks about how these songs were performed among the people: the singer began the song, then the choir (“podvoloski”) picked it up, varying the same melody. For example, the song “Oh, you, winter - winter...”. It can be performed in a “choral” way, dividing the roles: the student plays the part of the lead singer, and the teacher on another piano “depicts” the choir, which picks up the melody of the lead singer. After two or three lessons, the student performs the “backing vocals” and is clearly convinced that they have no less independence than the melody of the lead singer.

The student’s active and interested attitude towards polyphonic music depends entirely on the teacher’s method of work and his ability to lead the student to an imaginative perception of the basic elements of polyphonic music

From the first grades of school, the student must become familiar with all types of polyphonic writing - subvocal, contrasting, imitative - and master the basic skills of performing two and then three voices in light polyphonic works of various types. But it is hardly advisable to introduce a first-grader to the term imitation. It is easier to explain this concept using examples that are accessible and close to the child. So in plays such as the children's song “On a Green Meadow...”, you can play the original tune an octave higher and figuratively explain to the student the imitation, that is, the repetition of a motive or melody in a different voice, like the familiar concept of ECHO. Playing in an ensemble will greatly enliven the perception of imitation: the student plays the melody, and its imitation (ECHO) is played by the teacher, then vice versa. Imitation is the main polyphonic way of developing a theme. This technique is especially useful in plays where the imitation is accompanied by a melody in a different voice, as in play No. 17 from the collection of E.F. Gnessina’s “Piano ABC”: it could be called “Cuckoos”, so much so that a comparison of the imitation with the roll call of two cuckoos suggests itself. In this collection there are many etudes and plays built imitatively on themes of song and dance (studies No. 17, 31, 34, 35, 37). The best pedagogical material for cultivating the polyphonic sound thinking of a pianist is the keyboard heritage of J. S. Bach, and the first step on the path to understanding polyphony is the well-known collection called “The Notebook of Anna Magdalena Bach.” The small masterpieces included in the “Note Book” are mainly small dance pieces - polonaises, minuets, marches, distinguished by their extraordinary richness of melodies, rhythms, and moods. “The Music Book of A.M.Bach” is a kind of home music albums of the family of J.S.Bach. This included instrumental and vocal pieces of various types. These pieces, both his own and those of others, were written in notebooks by the hand of J. S. Bach himself, sometimes by his wife Anna Magdalena Bach; there are also pages written in the childish handwriting of one of Bach’s sons. The vocal works - arias and chorales included in the collection - were intended for performance in the home circle of Bach's family. The collection contains nine Minuets. In the time of J.S. Bach, the Minuet was a widespread, lively, well-known dance. It was danced both at home and at merry parties and during ceremonial palace ceremonies. Subsequently, the minuet became a fashionable aristocratic dance, which was enjoyed by prim courtiers in white powdered wigs with curls. A good illustration of the balls of that time in Artobolevskaya’s collection “First Encounter with Music”. Children should pay attention to the costumes of men and women, which to a greater extent determined the style of dancing: the women had creolines, immensely wide, demanding smooth movements, for men - legs covered in stockings in elegant high-heeled shoes, with beautiful garters - bows at the knees. The Minuet was danced with great solemnity. The music reflected in its melodic turns the smoothness and importance of bows, curtsies and curtsies. After listening to a Minuet performed by a teacher, the student determines its character, that it resembles more a song or a dance, therefore the character of the performance should be soft, smooth, melodious, in a calm, even movement. Then it is necessary to draw the student’s attention to the difference between the melody of the upper and lower voices, their independence and independence from each other, as if they were sung by two singers: the first high female voice is a soprano, and the second low male voice is a bass, or two voices are performed by two different tool. I. Braudo gave great importance ability to play piano. “The first concern of the leader,” he wrote, “will be to teach the student to extract from the piano a certain, necessary in this case sonority.

The performance of two voices in different instrumentation has great educational value for hearing. For this purpose, it is useful to play the first polyphonic samples being studied with the student so that he can actually hear the combination of two voices. One voice is performed by the teacher, the other voice by the student. If there are two instruments, it is useful to play both voices simultaneously on two instruments - this gives each melodic line greater relief. It is also useful to separate the voices through the octave (upper – flute, lower – violin). The upper voice in place - the lower one down an octave, the lower one in place - the upper one up an octave. The maximum possible separation of voices is two octaves. If two voices pass simultaneously in the part of a hand, we can recommend that the student first play these constructions with both hands: in this way it will be easier for him to achieve the desired sonority and the purpose of the work will become clearer. It is necessary to ensure that the student is able to play each voice from beginning to end completely completely and expressively. The importance of working on students' voices is often underestimated; it is carried out formally and is not brought to that degree of perfection when the student can actually perform each voice as an independent melodic line. After carefully studying individual voices, it is useful to practice them in pairs. To ensure the necessary auditory control, when performing voices, it is advisable to play them at first not from beginning to end, but in separate small formations, returning again to the most difficult places and playing them several times. Very effective method Work for advanced students is to sing one of the voices while the others are performed on the piano. It is also useful to sing polyphonic works in chorus. This contributes to the development of polyphonic hearing and familiarize students with polyphony. Sometimes it is useful to practice two voices, playing alternately in each of them only those segments that should prevail in their semantic meaning in a two-voice performance. If you have three or more voices, it is useful to work on each pair of voices. So, for example, with a three-voice presentation, it is useful to separately teach the upper and middle voices, upper and lower, lower and middle. It is very useful to play all the voices, focusing your attention on any one of them. Remove the middle voices (they are like filling), and lead the extreme ones, they are like a skeleton.

The upper voice is melodic, the lower is harmonic. Use timbre fantasies: lead one voice on the forte, removing the rest on the piano. When the middle voice stands out, it is difficult, but very rewarding to do. To hear the lower voice, change the voices crosswise, transfer the lower voice to the upper one, and the upper one to the lower one, this is difficult, but effective. Be sure to hear long notes and delayed ones. Hearing harmony formed by several voices - (vertical). Hear horizontal. Play slowly and stop on the downbeat.

J. S. Bach's polyphony is characterized by polydynamics, and to reproduce it clearly, one should, first of all, avoid dynamic exaggerations and should not deviate from the intended instrumentation until the end of the piece. A sense of proportion in relation to all dynamic changes in any work by J. S. Bach is a quality without which it is impossible to convey his music stylistically correctly. With Bach there is not an outpouring of emotional feelings, but a concentration of feelings - self-restraint, turning inward. Everything that is written in the text should sound: clarity, accuracy, melodiousness in sound. What is progressive in the text is played legato, the jump is the removal of the hand. Bach has equal beats, the strong beat does not stand out. He sets the phrasing in size. The main thing is not to break the line, and the beginning of a topic is not as important as its end. Bach creates surround sound, harmonic fullness. Whenever working on Bach's keyboard works, one should be aware of the following basic fact. In the manuscripts of Bach's keyboard works there are almost no performance instructions. Then this was accepted, because there were no musicians - performers in our understanding of the word; on the other hand, Bach meant almost exclusively the performance of his works by his sons and students who were well acquainted with his principles. As for dynamics, it is known that Bach used only three notations in his works, namely: forte, piano and, in rare cases, pianissimo. Bach did not use the expressions crescendo, dim, mp, ff, forks indicating increased and decreased sonority, and finally, accent marks. The use of tempo notations in Bach's texts is equally limited. And where they exist, they cannot be accepted modern meaning. His ADAGIO GRAUE tempos are not slow like ours, and his PRESTO is not as fast as ours. There is an opinion that the better you play Bach, the slower you can play it; the worse you play, the faster you need to take the tempo. The liveliness in Bach's works is based not on tempo, but on phrasing and emphasis. Of the many tasks that stand in the way of studying polyphony, the main one remains work on melodiousness, intonation expressiveness and independence of each voice separately.

2 – in different, almost nowhere matching phrasing (for example, in bars

3 – in the mismatch of strokes (legato and non-legato).

4 – in a mismatch of climaxes (for example, in the fifth – sixth bars, the melody of the upper voice rises and leads to the top, and the lower voice moves down and rises to the top only in the seventh bar)

6 – in a discrepancy in dynamic development (for example, in the fourth measure of the second part, the sonority of the lower voice increases, and the upper voice decreases).

The majority of keyboard works are works with unmarked articulation. Those easy keyboard works that make up the main Bach repertoire of a schoolchild are completely devoid of any performance instructions.

Of the 30 inventions and symphonies, only the F minor symphony contains two leagues. From all of the above, it is clear that single performance instructions found in Bach’s manuscripts can serve as valuable research material concerning the performance of ancient music.

We know that I.S. himself Bach intended light keyboard pieces not for concerts, but for studying and playing music at home. Therefore, the real tempo for an invention, a small prelude, a minuet, a march - count in this moment the pace that is most beneficial to the student. What pace is most useful at the moment. The pace at which this play is best performed by the student. Study tempo has as its main goal not preparation for a fast tempo, but preparation for understanding music. The fast tempo makes it impossible to listen to the music.

What the student gains by working at a slow tempo—an understanding of music—is the most essential. You should imagine the tempo as if they were being sung, sing them out loud or mentally to yourself. This way is the easiest way to establish a pace that is free from haste and immobility. But you should also make sure that slow pace did not turn into a series of slow, monotonous movements that have no connection with the music itself.

^ MATERIALS USED:

A. Alekseev “Methods of teaching piano playing.”

G. Neuhaus “On the art of piano playing”

I. Braudo “On the study of Bach’s keyboard works in music school.”

Materials of advanced training courses.

N. Kalinina “Bach’s keyboard music in piano class.”

MOUDOD Shchelkovsky Children's Music School municipal district Moscow region

Materials

for certification

Teacher by class

Piano

Kuznetsova

Nadezhda Mikhailovna

Methodological report piano teacher - page No. 1/1

Methodological report

piano teacher

Achegu V.B.

(MBOU DOD Children's Music School No. 5, Murmansk)

Features of working on polyphony in piano class.

The spirit of polyphony generally lies

at the heart of musical art,

based on intonation

S. Skrebkov.

“Different eras hear differently,” wrote R. Schumann.

Indeed, musical consciousness, the auditory attitude towards the perception of music depend on the dominant type of musical presentation, on the nature of the musical thinking of composers of a particular era.

Every musician or music lover, having come into contact with the music of the previous and our centuries, is convinced that the texture here is more saturated with simultaneously sounding meaningful melodic lines, rhythms, timbres, harmonic layers than in the works of composers of past centuries. In a word, modern music requires listeners, first of all, to have multifaceted, polyphonic hearing.

The formation of polyphony began in the depths of folk musical creativity under the primitive communal system, in the cultures of the ancient world. The emergence of polyphony is due to the development human consciousness, speech, thinking; it is associated with the formation of diversity human perception(extra-musical and musical).

In the structure of early polyphony, both horizontal and vertical were present from the very beginning. Moreover, according to musicology, the horizontal, polyphonic principle was more pronounced than the harmonic one. Thus, the ability of polyphonic perception has been inherent in the creators and performers of music from time immemorial.

The historical development of musical thinking determines the formation and development of polyphonic and homophonic-harmonic structures, their interaction as opposites in dialectical unity and their integration into complex polyphony. Exaggerated development of one type at the expense of another has a negative impact on music and its accessibility to the listener.

Based on this, it can be argued that teaching music must necessarily include both polyphonic and homophonic-harmonic types of polyphony: one cannot be understood in isolation from the other; Without mastering both, a full perception of music is impossible.

The concept of polyphony, polyphony in a broad sense, reflects the general property of complex polyphony, to which most musical works belong. Their perception requires much more developed abilities than purely polyphonic or homophonic-harmonic works. The ability to hear the simplest polyphony - necessary condition formation of a full-fledged perception of complex polyphony.

Therefore, we can assume that it is advisable to develop musical perception cyclically and in the following sequence:

• 
  monophony + elementary polyphony;
• 
  monophony + polyphony + homophony;
• 
  monophony + polyphony + homophony + complex polyphony.

Since polyphonic music exists, then both an ear for music and a person’s musical thinking have the prerequisites for perceiving polyphonic specificity.

It is known that monophonic music is perceived by rhythmic intonation, modal, timbre, and syntactic complexes. In polyphony, in addition to the indicated complexes, we encounter other, more complex structures - polyphonic and harmonic. They are also reflected by auditory consciousness as integral objects, and, of course, more in a complex way, for more high level than when perceiving monophonic music.

The ability to fully hear and perceive polyphony must develop in a certain, psychologically determined sequence. Science distinguishes between such types of musical hearing as melodic and harmonic. Along with them, we can safely introduce the concept of polyphonic hearing.

By the concept of polyphonic hearing we understand the ability to hear, trace and correlate the movement of several simultaneously unfolding melodies, melodic lines, and, more broadly, textural layers. Polyphonic hearing, based on melodic hearing, provides hearing of the horizontal multi-composition of the musical texture, while harmonic hearing provides hearing of chords, their relationships and the entire vertical organization of the texture.

Any perception is associated with thinking. Musical perception is associated with musical-imaginative thinking - thinking, as a result of which the musical image of a work is realized and mastered. In the process of repeated perception of polyphonic works, not only their specific images are imprinted, but, what is especially important, generalized ideas are formed about polyphonic complexes of form, about polyphony as a specific type of music, and, finally, about polyphony as a property of polyphony.

Polyphonic thinking is manifested in the ability to differentiate and holistically imagine the simultaneous development of several melodic lines, and more broadly, the parallel development of several textural layers with their polytonal, polymodal, polyharmonic, polyrhythmic, polytimbral richness. The “performance” of hearing depends to a greater extent on the feedback of thinking on it: hearing is finer, more differentiated, if mental needs are highly developed, if the listener knows how to listen, what to pay auditory attention to. A person can hear and perceive polyphonic music only if he has developed polyphonic thinking.

The process of cognition and thinking causes cognitive, so-called intellectual feelings. They are also characteristic of polyphonic thinking: the perceiver experiences not only the beauty of musical construction, but also the very process of assimilating the content and form of the work.

Memory plays a huge role in the perception of polyphony, as in perception in general. Memorization is facilitated by the brightness and expressiveness of the thematic material, its structural simplicity. The most important factor in memorization is the emotional beginning, the consolidation of perceived musical images through their experience (and subsequently awareness).

Let us trace the stages of polyphonic perception:

1. 
   The stage of vague, poorly differentiated, scattered perception. Perception lacks both emotionality and analytical-synthesizing activity. The student simply does not hear much; polyphonic voices are reflected in his consciousness in fragments, with little differentiation, and they are not united into coherent logical structures. Music seems to him obscure and unexpressive.
2. 
   The second stage is characterized by in-depth auditory analysis, differentiated and holistic development of the elements of structure and figurative organization of a polyphonic work. The formation of a new generalized and holistic occurs in consciousness. musical image, which is gradually synthesized from the interactions and relationships of individual voices, themes. This is the specificity of polyphonic thinking at this stage of polyphonic perception.
3. 
   The next stage is characterized by greater integrity of perception of a polyphonic work. Emotional reactions, due to the consciousness of logic, the meaning of the relationships between voices, become, as it were, “smart”. The spheres of feeling and reason come closer and merge in the recreation of an artistic image.

Polyphonic thinking and intellectual feelings in this process are very important aspects of musical perception.

However, in the process of guiding the development of students’ perceptual abilities, it is very important to ensure the correct correlation of children’s musical mental activity with emotional reactions to polyphonic music. Underestimation of this side gives rise to a rational attitude, dry rationalism, which has such a detrimental effect on the perception of any art, especially music. “An empty head can hide behind a fugue,” said R. Schumann. Emotionally emasculated works of a purely constructive nature cannot be used in musical teaching, because this contradicts the aesthetic essence of music as an art form that affects the listener, first of all, with its emotional and aesthetic content.

Working on polyphonic works is an integral part of learning piano performance. After all, piano music is all polyphonic in the broad sense of the word. Education of polyphonic thinking, polyphonic hearing, that is, the ability to discretely, differentiatedly perceive (hear) and reproduce on an instrument several sound lines that are combined with each other in the simultaneous development of sound lines - one of the most important and most complex sections of musical education.

Polyphony is a special sound of voices. Therefore, first of all, it is necessary to teach the child to hear one voice, to cultivate linearity. The student must hear its length, beginning and end, and hear the expressiveness of the voice. It is necessary to learn to play without “shouting”, accurately connecting durations; precise phrasing of motives, understanding the relationships of small links. The precise phrasing of motives and understanding of the interconnection of small links are important. The student must be able to work on intonation expressiveness. Distinguish voices using dynamics and instrumentation in work.

Modern piano pedagogy places great confidence in the musical intelligence of children. Based on the experience of B. Bartok, K. Orff, the teacher opens up an interesting and complex world of polyphonic music to the child from the first year of study at a music school.

The polyphonic repertoire for beginners consists of light polyphonic arrangements of subvocal folk songs, close and understandable to children in their content. The teacher talks about how these songs were performed among the people: the singer began the song, then the choir (“podvoloski”) picked it up, varying the same melody. Taking, for example, a Russian folk song, the teacher invites the student to perform it in a “choral” way, dividing the roles: the student plays the learned part of the lead singer during the lesson, and the teacher, preferably on another instrument, as this will give each melodic line greater relief, “depicts” a choir that picks up the melody of the chorus. After two or three lessons, the student performs the “backing vocals” and is clearly convinced that they are no less independent than the melody of the lead singer. When working on individual voices, it is necessary to achieve expressive and melodious performance by the student. I would like to draw attention to this all the more because the importance of working on students’ voices is often underestimated; it is carried out formally and is not brought to that degree of perfection when the student can actually perform each voice separately as a melodic line. It is very useful to learn each voice by heart. By playing both parts alternately with the teacher in an ensemble, the student not only clearly feels the independent life of each of them, but also hears the entire piece in its entirety in the simultaneous combination of both voices, which greatly facilitates the most difficult stage of the work - the transfer of both parts into the hands of the student.

Further, the study of polyphonic plays of the Baroque era, among which the works of J. S. Bach occupy the first place, becomes especially important. During this era, the rhetorical foundations of musical language were formed - musical rhetorical figures associated with certain semantic symbolism (figures of a sigh, exclamation, question, silence, amplification, various forms of movement and musical structure). Familiarity with the musical language of the Baroque era serves as the basis for the accumulation of intonation vocabulary young musician and helps him understand the musical language of subsequent eras.

The best pedagogical material for cultivating the polyphonic sound thinking of a pianist is the keyboard heritage of J. S. Bach, and the first step on the path to “polyphonic Parnassus” is the well-known collection called “The Notebook of Anna Magdalena Bach.” The small masterpieces included in the “Notebook” are mainly small dance pieces - polonaises, minuets and marches, distinguished by their extraordinary richness of melodies, rhythms, and moods. It is best to introduce the student to the collection itself, i.e., the “Note Book,” and not to individual pieces scattered across different collections. It is very useful to tell your child that the two “Music Notebooks of Anna Magdalena Bach” are unique home music albums of the family of J. S. Bach. This included instrumental and vocal pieces of various types. These plays, both his own and those of others, are written in notebooks by the hand of J. S. Bach himself, sometimes by his wife Anna Magdalena Bach, and there are also pages written in the childish handwriting of one of Bach’s sons. The vocal works - arias and chorales included in the collection - were intended for performance in the home circle of Bach's family.

You need to understand well that Bach’s music is keyboard music and only secondarily organ music. Bach composed a lot for the clavier, and the clavier is a German generic name of three keyboard instruments: harpsichord, clavichord and organ. And no matter how much these instruments differ from each other (especially the organ from the harpsichord), everything Bach created for three instruments is keyboard music. As for us who teach piano, due to the tradition to which we are heirs, the main priority here is to discuss the problems of playing Bach on the piano. That is why our main task is to find the answer to the question: “What exact steps in today’s piano pedagogy should be taken in order to make Bach both alive and stylistically authentic, so that his music, even in student performance, carries meanings as clear to the listener as like those that the music of Beethoven, Chopin or Prokofiev carries within itself?

Articulation.

Articulation is one of many expressive means in ancient music, and in particular, in the music of Bach. Articulation is often compared to diction, and this is a completely correct analogy. Although it by no means exhausts the entire spectrum of meanings related to performing articulation. The usual interpretation of this concept, which often comes down to a simple differentiation between legato and non legato, needs to be significantly expanded. In the book of one of Arthur Schnabel’s students it is written: “Articulation - in Schnabel’s deep understanding of this term - means identifying the musical “details” of a piece by all means available to the performer - duration of sound, dynamics, time distribution, etc. Articulation is a very subtle element in performance, much too subtle to be accurately recorded in the notes.” In general, everything said in this work about “melodic,” “harmonic,” “metric,” and “rhythmic” articulation is directly related to Bach. There are two main problems in our system of musical education. One of them concerns legato, which is given increased attention in music school - and this is not the only, although one of the most important, ways of articulating a melody.

The second problem is related to the fact that our musical ear is formed mainly on the basis of harmonic four-voices. We don’t think much about it, but such musical education gives rise to certain consequences, in particular, the inability of a child playing the piano to perceive music linearly. The central problem here is the method of communication between sounds, which is precisely determined by the choice of one or another articulatory technique. Thus, articulation is the most important way of organizing motives, phrases and thereby identifying the character, and ultimately constructing the form of a particular fragment or an entire work. It is important to emphasize that articulation is primary in relation to tempo, because in ancient music it was articulation that determined the tempo, and not vice versa. And it is precisely ignoring this dependence that leads in many editions to an incorrect definition of tempo. In addition, articulation plays important role in identifying the rhythmic pulse, rhythmic energy, that is, those qualities that are extremely significant in Bach’s motor music. Two interrelated aspects emerged. The first concerns the need to educate linear, “horizontal” hearing. The second aspect concerns articulation itself. This does not require a complete rejection of traditional ideas, however, our views on articulation need to be expanded and brought closer to modern trends.

Defenders of legato often refer to the fact that in the famous “Instructions” for the “Inventions and Symphonies”, written by Bach in his own hand in 1723, there is an indication of the need to master cantable art, that is, the skills of singing. But, according to Schweitzer, this provision applies only to two-voice Inventions, intended by Bach not for the harpsichord, but for the clavichord - an instrument on which such melodiousness was quite feasible. Of course, today no serious pianist would deny the enormous role of cantabile, as well as legato. However, the great interpreters of both baroque and romantic music used the most different types articulations, including portamento, marcato, and even non legato. And this is quite understandable, since at moments of highest expression it was often much more natural to use “recitation” rather than “singing” the melody.

So, the concept of legato itself should be interpreted not as one isolated means, but as a more or less wide range of means. There are a lot of gradations here. “You cannot think,” writes I. Braudo in his book “Articulation,” that articulatory techniques should always be considered as an arrangement from legato to staccato. You can build a palette of tools located around the legato line. These means obviously range from legatissimo to dry legato. Isaiah Braudo, our famous organist and teacher, who has devoted many years to studying this problem, also says that in each voice it is necessary to create conditions for autonomous, that is, different articulation, since this is what gives rise to sufficient relief in polyphony. The choice of technique for each voice should not be strictly determined, because it depends on the imaginary instrumental “analogue”, which is latently present in many of Bach’s keyboard works. When studying Bach, you need to look for various ways articulation. There are many of them, but erudition and rich auditory experience in the field of mastering baroque music are required in order to choose in each specific case something that is suitable in style and, at the same time, allows you to perform a given fragment with proper expressiveness.

Tempo and metrhythm .

Moving on to the problems of tempo and metrhythm, do not forget that the choice of tempo in Bach’s music in many cases depends on the choice of articulation, so that if the articulatory technique changes, not only the sound, but also the tempo appearance of the work can become completely different. The sense of time in music is just as important as the sense of sound.

The question of the pulsation of rhythm in Bach's music is very important and complex. Substantive statements on this topic can be found in the work of Alexander Alexandrov and Mikhail Arkadyev. In particular, it says: “If for Viennese classics characterized by pulsation of “main” metric beats in quarters in sizes 2/4, 3/4, 4/4.., as well as pulsation of measures in two-beat, three-beat, four-beat, etc. structures, then Bach’s music is characterized by intra-bar “fine pulsation”. This constant, elastic pulse, which is the necessary internal core around which the entire musical fabric “weaves,” is always present in Bach.”

Pace.

It is worth paying attention to the fact that the Italian terms that we currently regard as tempo - for example, Allegro, Andante, Presto and others - were originally interpreted differently, and their meaning was significantly different from our current understanding. For most of Bach's contemporaries, such designations served as indications of the nature of the movement, or affect. Tempo designations were used not so much to determine the speed of movement, but to express emotional content.

The emphasis was more on mood, on the so-called "affect", than on direct indication of tempo. "Allegro" meant "fun", "active" (not "soon"); “Grave” – “seriously, strictly” (not “slowly”); “Allegretto” is “active and graceful with a touch of playfulness”; “Andante” - “passively, measuredly”; “Adagio” - “heartfelt”, etc. Let us formulate a method for determining tempo in Bach’s works. First of all, we will rely on what we see in the author’s text, and then turn to the editor’s instructions. Our own notations follow. Which we contribute in the course of teaching work. In addition, we must not forget that one of the incomprehensible secrets of Bach's work is the extreme stability of his music to changes in tempo. The nature of the work in such cases, of course, changes, but this does not detract from its artistic merits. And only Bach’s texts have this property.

Dynamics.

When performing Bach, in such an area as dynamics, we must limit ourselves to the use of the dynamic capabilities of the piano rather than expand these capabilities. Such self-restraint requires a certain auditory discipline and, of course, is not an easy task. Polyphony is music of a strictly style. And in Bach’s music, in particular, the stability of emotional states is important. Whereas traditional musical education accustoms one to the instability of such states and to constant dynamic changes. Thus, in this case, we must rebuild our inner emotional world and, accordingly, our attitude towards the instrument on which we have the good fortune to play Bach’s music.

Bach's polyphony is characterized by polydynamics, and to reproduce it clearly, one should, first of all, avoid dynamic exaggerations and should not deviate from the intended instrumentation until the end of the piece. A sense of proportion in relation to all dynamic changes in any work by Bach is a quality without which it is impossible to convey his music stylistically correctly. Only through a deep analytical study of the basic laws of Bach's style can one comprehend the composer's performing intentions. All the efforts of the teacher should be directed towards this, starting with the “Notebook of Anna Magdalena Bach”.

Based on the material of the pieces from the “Note Book,” the student learns new features of Bach’s music, which he will encounter in works of varying degrees of complexity. For example, with the peculiarities of Bach rhythm, which is characterized in most cases by the use of adjacent durations: eighths and quarters (all marches and minuets), sixteenths and eighths (“Bagpipes”). Another distinctive feature of Bach’s style, which I. Braudo identified and called the “eight-piece technique,” ​​is the contrast in the articulation of adjacent durations: small durations are played legato, and larger ones – non legato or staccato. However, this technique should be used based on the nature of the pieces: the melodious Minuet in d-moll, Minuet No. 15 in c-moll, and the solemn Polonaise No. 19 in g-moll are an exception to the “eighth-major rule.”

When performing vocal works by I.S. Bach (Aria No. 33 in F-moll, Aria No. 40 in F-Dur), as well as his chorale preludes (at a further stage of training), one must not lose sight of the fact that the fermata sign does not mean a temporary stop in these pieces, as in modern musical notation; this sign only indicated the end of the verse.

Melismas.

When working on Bach's polyphony, students often encounter melismas, the most important artistic and expressive means of music of the 17th-18th centuries. If we take into account the differences in editorial recommendations, both regarding the number of decorations and in their decoding, it becomes clear that the student will definitely need help and specific instructions from the teacher. The teacher must proceed from a sense of style performed works, own performing and teaching experience, as well as available methodological manuals. We can recommend the article by L.I. Roizman “On the execution of decorations (melismas) in the works of ancient composers,” which examines this issue in detail and provides instructions from I.S. Bach. You can turn to Adolf Beischlag’s major study “Ornamentation in Music”, and of course, get acquainted with Bach’s interpretation of the performance of melismas according to the table compiled by the composer himself in “Wilhelm Friedemann Bach’s Night Notebook”, covering the main typical examples. Three points are important here:

1. 
   Bach recommends performing melismas based on the duration of the main sound (with some exceptions);
2. 
   All melismas begin with the upper auxiliary sound (except for the crossed out mordent and a few exceptions, for example, if the sound on which the trill or uncrossed mordent is placed is already preceded by the nearest upper sound, then the decoration is performed from the main sound);
3. 
   Auxiliary sounds in melismas are performed on the steps of the diatonic scale, except in cases where the alteration sign is indicated by the composer - under the melisma sign or above it.

A new step in mastering polyphony is acquaintance with the collection “Little Preludes and Fugues”, and from it many threads stretch to the “Inventions”, “Symphonies” and “HTK”. I would like to emphasize that when studying Bach’s works, gradualness and consistency are very important. “You cannot go through fugues and symphonies unless you have thoroughly studied the inventions and small preludes,” warned I. Braudo. These collections, in addition to their artistic merits, give the teacher the opportunity to deepen the student’s acquaintance with characteristic features Bach's phrasing, articulation, dynamics, voicing, to explain to him such important concepts as theme, opposition, hidden polyphony, imitation and others.

The student became acquainted with imitation in the first grade of music school. In middle school, his idea of ​​imitation expands. He must understand it as a repetition of the theme - the main musical idea - in a different voice.

Imitation is the main polyphonic way of developing a theme. Therefore, a thorough and comprehensive study of the topic, be it a Little Prelude, Invention, Symphony or Fugue, is the primary task in working on any polyphonic work of an imitative nature.

When starting to analyze a topic, the student independently or with the help of a teacher determines its boundaries. Then he must understand the figurative and intonational nature of the topic. The chosen expressive interpretation of the theme determines the interpretation of the entire work. That is why it is so necessary to grasp all the sound subtleties of the theme performance, starting from its first performance. While still studying pieces from Anna Magdalena Bach's Notebook, the student realized the motivic structure of Bach's melodies.

Speaking about intramotive articulation, the child should be taught to distinguish between the main types of motives:

1. 
   Iambic motives, which go from weak to strong tenses;
2. 
   The motives are trochaic, which begin on the strong beat and end on the weak beat.

The iambic structure of Bach's themes also determines the peculiarity of Bach's phrasing, which students must be aware of. Starting from a weak beat of the bar, the theme freely “steps over” the bar line, ending on a strong beat, thus, the boundaries of the bar do not coincide with the boundaries of the theme, which leads to a softening and weakening of the strong beats of the bar, subordinate to the inner life of the melody, its desire for semantic culminating peaks - main thematic accents.

Bach's thematic accents often do not coincide with metric ones; they are determined not by meter, as in classical melody, but by the inner life of the theme. The intonation peaks of Bach's theme usually occur at weak beats. “In Bach’s theme, all the movement and all the strength rush to the main emphasis,” wrote A. Schweitzer. – On the way to him, everything is restless, chaotic; upon his entry, the tension is discharged, everything that precedes it immediately becomes clear. The listener perceives the topic as a whole with clearly defined contours.” And further, “... in order to play Bach rhythmically, one must emphasize not the strong beats of the bar, but those on which the emphasis falls in the meaning of the phrasing.” Students unfamiliar with the peculiarities of Bach's phrasing often replace the thematic accent with a bar accent, why the topic they fall into pieces, lose integrity and inner meaning.

Another essential feature of Bach's thematicism is the so-called hidden polyphony or hidden polyphony. Since this feature is common to almost all Bach melodies, being able to recognize it appears to be a critical skill that prepares students for more complex tasks.

It is necessary to draw the student's attention to the fact that Bach's melody often creates the impression of a concentrated polyphonic fabric. Such richness of a monophonic line is achieved by the presence of a hidden voice in it. This hidden voice appears only in the melody where there are leaps. The sound left by the jump continues to sound in our consciousness until the moment a tone adjacent to it appears, into which it resolves.

Such a movement of the hidden voice will help to consolidate in the child’s mind a figurative name – “path”. Such a track should be performed sonorously, with support. The hand and finger are lowered onto the keys slightly from above, which results in a lateral movement of the hand. A voice repeating the same sound should be played barely audible. The student will use the same technique when working on more complex works.

Often teachers have a question: how to perform imitation - to emphasize it or not. There is no clear answer to this question. In each specific case, one should proceed from the nature and structure of the play. If the counterposition is close in nature to the theme and develops it, then in order to preserve the unity of the theme and the counterposition, imitation should not be emphasized. As L. Roizman figuratively put it, if each implementation of the theme is performed a little louder than other voices, then “... we find ourselves witnessing a performance about which we can say: forty times the theme and not a single time of the fugue.” In Bach's two-voice polyphonic pieces, imitation should most often be emphasized not by volume, but by a different timbre from the other voice. If the upper voice is played loudly and expressively, and the lower voice is played easily and invariably quietly, the imitation will be heard more clearly than if it is performed loudly. The theme - depending on the dynamic plan - may sometimes sound quieter than other voices, but it should always be significant, expressive, noticeable.

Marking Braudo's imitations can be considered appropriate in cases where the main character of the work is associated with a constant alternation of motives, with their constant transfer from one voice to another. The roll call of voices in this case is included in the main image of the work.

Following the mastery of the topic and answer, work on the counter-addition begins. The counter-compound is worked out differently than the theme, since the nature of its sound and dynamics can only be established in combination with the answer. Therefore, the main method of work in this case is to perform the answer and counter addition in an ensemble with a teacher, and at home - with both hands, which greatly facilitates finding the appropriate dynamic colors.

Having worked well on the theme and the counter-addition, and having clearly understood the relationships: theme - answer, theme - counter-addition, answer - counter-addition, you can move on to carefully working on the melodic line of each voice. Long before they are combined, the piece is performed in two voices in an ensemble with a teacher - first in sections, then in its entirety and, finally, completely transferred into the hands of the student. And then it turns out that in most cases the student, even if he hears the upper voice quite well, does not hear the lower voice at all, as a melodic line. In order to really hear both voices, you should work by concentrating your attention and hearing on one of them - the top one (as in non-polyphonic works). Both voices are played, but in different ways: the upper one, to which attention is directed, is f, espressivo, the lower one is pp (exactly).

G. Neuhaus called this method the “exaggeration” method. Practice shows that this work requires just such a large difference in sound strength and expressiveness. Then not only the upper, main voice at the moment, but also the lower one can be clearly heard. They seem to be played by different performers on different instruments. But active attention, active listening without special effort is directed to the voice that is performed more prominently.

Then we turn our attention to the lower voice. We play it f, espressivo, and the top one – pp. Now both voices are heard and perceived by the student even more clearly, the lower one because it is extremely “close,” and the upper one because it is already well known.

When practicing in this way, good results can be achieved in the shortest possible time, since the sound picture becomes clearer for the student. Then playing both voices as equals, he equally hears the expressive flow of each voice (phrasing, nuance). Such precise and clear hearing of each line is an indispensable condition in the performance of polyphony. Only having achieved it can you then work fruitfully on the work as a whole.

When performing a multi-voice piece, the difficulty of hearing the entire fabric (compared to a two-voice piece) increases. Concern for the accuracy of voice production makes it necessary to special attention relate to fingering. The fingering of Bach's pieces cannot be based only on pianistic convenience, as Czerny did in his editions. Busoni was the first to revive the fingering principles of Bach's era, as most consistent with identifying the motivic structure and clear pronunciation of motives. The principles of shifting fingers, sliding a finger from a black key to a white one, and silently replacing fingers are widely used in polyphonic works. At first, this sometimes seems difficult and unacceptable to the student. Therefore, we must try to involve him in a joint discussion of fingerings and clarification of all controversial issues. And then seek mandatory compliance with it.

So, having determined the nature of the sound of the theme, its articulation, phrasing, culmination, having carefully played out and sung into the theme, the student proceeds to get acquainted with the first imitation of the theme, called the answer or companion. Here it is necessary to direct the student’s attention to the question-and-answer dialogue of the topic and its imitation. In order not to turn the imitations into a monotonous series of repetitions of the same theme, Braudo advises playing one of the themes, singing the other, then performing the dialogue between the leader and the companion at two pianos. This type of work greatly stimulates hearing and polyphonic thinking.

Working on three- to four-voice works, the student can no longer learn each voice specifically, but learn two voices in different combinations: first and second, second and third, first and third, playing one of them f, espressivo, and the other pp. This method is also useful when combining all three voices together: first one voice is played loudly, and the other two are played quietly. Then the dynamics of the voices change. The time spent on such work varies depending on the degree of advancement of the student. But teaching this way is useful; this method is perhaps the most effective.

Other ways to work on polyphony include:

• 
  execution different voices various strokes (legato and non legato or staccato);
• 
  performance of all voices piano, transparent;
• 
  the performance of the voices is smooth with specially focused attention on one of them;
• 
  performance without one voice (imagine these voices internally or sing).

To understand a polyphonic work and the meaningfulness of the work, the student must from the very beginning imagine its form, its tonal-harmonic plan. A more vivid identification of form is facilitated by knowledge of the unique dynamics in polyphony, especially Bach's, which consists in the fact that the very spirit of music is not characterized by its overly crushed, wave-like application. Bach's polyphony is most characterized by architectural dynamics, in which changes in large structures are accompanied by new dynamic lighting.

The main ways to work on a polyphonic work:

1. 
   Play each voice separately for a long time and learn by heart the names of the notes;
2. 
   Connect voices according to the “teacher-student” principle; in different registers;
3. 
   Play each voice with singing, naming the notes;
4. 
   Play voices in different combinations;
5. 
   Play with emphasis on any voice;
6. 
   If the stroke is similar in 2 voices, it is imperative to play with a different stroke;
7. 
   Isolate interludes;
8. 
   Carefully analyze the tonal plan;
9. 
   Instrumentation of voices is required;
10. 
    Feel like a ruler, the master of all voices;
11. 
    Fill voices with meaning, look for comparisons;
12. 
    Explain in detail the genre nature of the works;
13. 
    Achieve meaningful play, work on rhythm, on cadences (voice them significantly);
14. 
    Work on melismatics (sing with the name of the notes), achieve the quality of melismas, work on them carefully and a lot;
15. 
    Avoid diversity of dynamics; but the voices must maintain dynamic mobility.
16. 
    You cannot change the instrumentation until the end of the voice. You cannot change the theme of the theme in any event throughout the entire event!

Murmansk 2014

MUNICIPAL EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION FOR ADDITIONAL CHILDREN'S EDUCATION
CHILDREN'S MUSIC SCHOOL
SHCHELKOVSKY MUNICIPAL DISTRICT
MOSCOW REGION

Methodical message

"Work on polyphony in the junior classes of children's music schools."

Teacher

Shchelkovo-2011

Work on polyphony at Children's Music School

Folk music, especially the music of the Russian people, is always imbued with the spirit of ensemble, collectivity, and carries within itself the tradition of polyphony.

The melodic melodiousness of folk music is not monophonic in nature. She strives for collective intonation, to reveal herself through the choir, through polyphony. Classical music - in opera, in symphony, in chamber forms - has always provided high examples of rich and diverse polyphony, which has its origins in folk tradition. Polyphony, as an effective force in music, could not help but attract the creative attention of composers of various directions throughout the history of music. Composers have never been indifferent to polyphony. Learning polyphony is the key to mastering the art of piano playing. After all, piano music is all polyphonic in the broad sense of the word. To master the piano well, as Yuri Bogdanov said, you need to play etudes and works. Therefore, in the initial years of study at a children's music school, it is necessary to cultivate interest and love for music, and therefore for polyphonic music.

The best guide to the world of music for a child is a song. It is this that enables the teacher to interest the student in music. The first grader willingly sings familiar songs, listens with interest and guesses the different characters of the plays that the teacher plays for him (funny, sad, dance, solemn, etc.) Along the way, the child should be told that sounds, like words, convey content and different feelings . In the first lesson, I usually play a “game” with a student to determine the nature of music. First, I play him various pieces, where he must determine the mood conveyed by the composer, then I ask the student to determine the nature of the music by the title or by the picture, which clearly conveys the mood. Children especially like the plays from the collection “Getting to Know Music” by Artobolevskaya. For example, the play “Where are you, Leka”, based on the picture, children tell a whole story about why the dog is sad. The picture accompanying the Minuet clearly conveys the era of that time, the costumes of those dancing at the ball. Based on children's stories, one can determine the child's horizons, his vocabulary, sociability, etc. This is how musical impressions gradually accumulate. Melodies of children's and folk songs in the lightest single-voice transcriptions for piano are the most intelligible educational material for beginners in terms of content. Careful selection of repertoire is of great importance in a student's musical success. Songs should be chosen simple but meaningful, characterized by bright intonation expressiveness, with a clearly defined climax. Thus, from the first steps, the focus of the student’s attention becomes a melody, which he sings expressively, and then just as expressively tries to “sing” on the piano. The expressive and melodious performance of single-voice melodic songs is subsequently transferred to the combination of two of the same melodies in light polyphonic pieces. The naturalness of this transition is the key to maintaining a keen interest in polyphony in the future.

The polyphonic repertoire for beginners consists of light polyphonic arrangements of subvocal folk songs, close and understandable to children in their content. The teacher talks about how these songs were performed among the people: the singer began the song, then the choir (“podvoloski”) picked it up, varying the same melody. For example, the song “Oh, you, winter - winter...”. It can be performed in a “choral” way, dividing the roles: the student plays the part of the lead singer, and the teacher on another piano “depicts” the choir, which picks up the melody of the lead singer. After two or three lessons, the student performs the “backing vocals” and is clearly convinced that they have no less independence than the melody of the lead singer.

The student’s active and interested attitude towards polyphonic music depends entirely on the teacher’s method of work and his ability to lead the student to an imaginative perception of the basic elements of polyphonic music

From the first grades of school, the student must become familiar with all types of polyphonic writing - subvocal, contrasting, imitative - and master the basic skills of performing two and then three voices in light polyphonic works of various types. But it is hardly advisable to introduce a first-grader to the term imitation. It is easier to explain this concept using examples that are accessible and close to the child. So in plays such as the children's song “On a Green Meadow...”, you can play the original tune an octave higher and figuratively explain to the student the imitation, that is, the repetition of a motive or melody in a different voice, like the familiar concept of ECHO. Playing in an ensemble will greatly enliven the perception of imitation: the student plays the melody, and its imitation (ECHO) is played by the teacher, then vice versa. Imitation is the main polyphonic way of developing a theme. This technique is especially useful in plays where imitation is accompanied by a melody in a different voice, as in piece No. 17 from the collection “Piano ABC”: it could be called “Cuckoos”, so much so that a comparison of imitation with the roll call of two cuckoos suggests itself. In this collection there are many etudes and plays built imitatively on themes of song and dance (studies No. 17, 31, 34, 35, 37). The best pedagogical material for cultivating polyphonic sound thinking of a pianist is the clavier heritage, and the first step towards understanding polyphony is the well-known collection called “The Music Book of Anna Magdalena Bach.” The small masterpieces included in the “Note Book” are mainly small dance pieces - polonaises, minuets, marches, distinguished by their extraordinary richness of melodies, rhythms, and moods. “Music notebook” is a kind of family home music albums. This included instrumental and vocal pieces of various types. These plays, both his own and those of others, are written in notebooks in the handwriting of Bach himself, sometimes his wife Anna Magdalena, and there are also pages written in the childish handwriting of one of Bach’s sons. The vocal works - arias and chorales included in the collection - were intended for performance in the home circle of Bach's family. The collection contains nine Minuets. At the time, the Minuet was a widespread, lively, well-known dance. It was danced both at home and at merry parties and during ceremonial palace ceremonies. Subsequently, the minuet became a fashionable aristocratic dance, which was enjoyed by prim courtiers in white powdered wigs with curls. A good illustration of the balls of that time in Artobolevskaya’s collection “First Encounter with Music”. Children should pay attention to the costumes of men and women, which to a greater extent determined the style of dancing: women had creoles, immensely wide, requiring smooth movements, men had stocking-covered legs in elegant high-heeled shoes, with beautiful garters - bows at the knees. The Minuet was danced with great solemnity. The music reflected in its melodic turns the smoothness and importance of bows, curtsies and curtsies. After listening to a Minuet performed by a teacher, the student determines its character, that it resembles more a song or a dance, therefore the character of the performance should be soft, smooth, melodious, in a calm, even movement. Then it is necessary to draw the student’s attention to the difference between the melody of the upper and lower voices, their independence and independence from each other, as if they were sung by two singers: the first high female voice is a soprano, and the second low male voice is a bass, or two voices are performed by two different tool. I. Braudo attached great importance to the ability to instrument the piano. “The first concern of the leader,” he wrote, “will be to teach the student to extract from the piano a certain sonority that is necessary in this case.

The performance of two voices in different instrumentation has great educational value for hearing. For this purpose, it is useful to play the first polyphonic samples being studied with the student so that he can actually hear the combination of two voices. One voice is performed by the teacher, the other voice by the student. If there are two instruments, it is useful to play both voices simultaneously on two instruments - this gives each melodic line greater relief. It is also useful to separate the voices through the octave (upper – flute, lower – violin). The upper voice in place - the lower one down an octave, the lower one in place - the upper one up an octave. The maximum possible separation of voices is two octaves. If two voices pass simultaneously in the part of a hand, we can recommend that the student first play these constructions with both hands: in this way it will be easier for him to achieve the desired sonority and the purpose of the work will become clearer. It is necessary to ensure that the student is able to play each voice from beginning to end completely completely and expressively. The importance of working on students' voices is often underestimated; it is carried out formally and is not brought to that degree of perfection when the student can actually perform each voice as an independent melodic line. After carefully studying individual voices, it is useful to practice them in pairs. To ensure the necessary auditory control, when performing voices, it is advisable to play them at first not from beginning to end, but in separate small formations, returning again to the most difficult places and playing them several times. A very effective way of working for advanced students is to sing one of the voices while the others are played on the piano. It is also useful to sing polyphonic works in chorus. This contributes to the development of polyphonic hearing and familiarize students with polyphony. Sometimes it is useful to practice two voices, playing alternately in each of them only those segments that should prevail in their semantic meaning in a two-voice performance. If you have three or more voices, it is useful to work on each pair of voices. So, for example, with a three-voice presentation, it is useful to separately teach the upper and middle voices, upper and lower, lower and middle. It is very useful to play all the voices, focusing your attention on any one of them. Remove the middle voices (they are like filling), and lead the extreme ones, they are like a skeleton.

The upper voice is melodic, the lower is harmonic. Use timbre fantasies: lead one voice on the forte, removing the rest on the piano. When the middle voice stands out, it is difficult, but very rewarding to do. To hear the lower voice, change the voices crosswise, transfer the lower voice to the upper one, and the upper one to the lower one, this is difficult, but effective. Be sure to hear long notes and delayed ones. Hearing harmony formed by several voices - (vertical). Hear horizontal. Play slowly and stop on the downbeat.

Polyphony is characterized by polydynamics and to reproduce it clearly, one should, first of all, avoid dynamic exaggerations and should not deviate from the intended instrumentation until the end of the piece. A sense of proportion in relation to all dynamic changes in any work is a quality without which it is impossible to convey its music stylistically correctly. With Bach there is not an outpouring of emotional feelings, but a concentration of feelings - self-restraint, turning inward. Everything that is written in the text should sound: clarity, accuracy, melodiousness in sound. What is progressive in the text is played legato, a jump is the removal of the hand. Bach has equal beats, the strong beat does not stand out. He sets the phrasing in size. The main thing is not to break the line, and the beginning of a topic is not as important as its end. Bach creates surround sound, harmonic fullness. Whenever working on Bach's keyboard works, one should be aware of the following basic fact. In the manuscripts of Bach's keyboard works there are almost no performance instructions. Then this was accepted, because there were no musicians - performers in our understanding of the word; on the other hand, Bach meant almost exclusively the performance of his works by his sons and students who were well acquainted with his principles. As for dynamics, it is known that Bach used only three notations in his works, namely: forte, piano and, in rare cases, pianissimo. Bach did not use the expressions crescendo, dim, mp, ff, forks indicating increased and decreased sonority, and finally, accent marks. The use of tempo notations in Bach's texts is equally limited. And where they exist, they cannot be taken in their modern meaning. His ADAGIO GRAUE tempos are not slow like ours, and his PRESTO is not as fast as ours. There is an opinion that the better you play Bach, the slower you can play it; the worse you play, the faster you need to take the tempo. The liveliness in Bach's works is based not on tempo, but on phrasing and emphasis. Of the many tasks that stand in the way of studying polyphony, the main one remains work on melodiousness, intonation expressiveness and independence of each voice separately.

2 – in different, almost nowhere matching phrasing (for example, in bars

3 – in the mismatch of strokes (legato and non-legato).

4 – in a mismatch of climaxes (for example, in the fifth – sixth bars, the melody of the upper voice rises and leads to the top, and the lower voice moves down and rises to the top only in the seventh bar)

6 – in a discrepancy in dynamic development (for example, in the fourth measure of the second part, the sonority of the lower voice increases, and the upper voice decreases).

The majority of keyboard works belong to works with unmarked articulation. Those easy keyboard works that make up the main Bach repertoire of a schoolchild are completely devoid of any performance instructions.

Of the 30 inventions and symphonies, only the F minor symphony contains two leagues. From all of the above, it is clear that single performance instructions found in Bach’s manuscripts can serve as valuable research material concerning the performance of ancient music.

We know that he himself intended the easy keyboard pieces not for concerts, but for studying and playing music at home. Therefore, the real tempo for an invention, a small prelude, a minuet, a march is considered at the moment to be the tempo that is most useful for the student. What pace is most useful at the moment. The tempo at which the piece is best performed by the student. Study tempo has as its main goal not preparation for a fast tempo, but preparation for understanding music. The fast tempo makes it impossible to listen to the music.

What the student gains by working at a slow tempo—an understanding of music—is the most essential. You should imagine the tempo as if they were being sung, sing them out loud or mentally to yourself. This way is the easiest way to establish a pace that is free from haste and immobility. But you should also make sure that the slow tempo does not turn into a series of slow, monotonous movements that have no connection with the music itself.

MATERIALS USED:

1. A. Alekseev “Methods of teaching piano playing.”

2. G. Neuhaus “On the art of piano playing”

3. I. Braudo “On the study of Bach’s keyboard works in a music school.”

4. Materials of advanced training courses.

5. N. Kalinina “Bach’s keyboard music in piano class.”

MOUDOD Children's music school of the Shchelkovsky municipal district of the Moscow region

Materials

for certification

Teacher by class

piano

Kuznetsova

Nadezhda Mikhailovna