When my son Jonah was four years old, his Montessori daycare teacher asked me if I could create a classical music CD for the class to listen to during playtime. This music had to be accessible for the young ones. Here is what I did. I took adagios (slow movements) from my favorite piano concertos, and that was it. We’ll do the same for the next part of our exploration of #PianoAdagios and we’ll see how long it takes.
The speed of playing is called a tempo – here is a continuum of slow tempos. As I understand it, there is plenty of subjectivity to this as well.
We are going to start our exploration of piano adagios with Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat minor, composed in 1874. Tchaikovsky initially dedicated it to Nikolai Rubinstein, who harshly criticized it as “unplayable” and “worthless.” Undeterred, Tchaikovsky revised it slightly and entrusted it to conductor Hans von Bülow, who premiered it triumphantly in Boston on October 25, 1875.
Let’s explore the 2nd movement from this concerto:
You can listen to the full concerto here:
