Performing Bach's Keyboard Music Tempo

Author(s): George A. Kochevitsky

Source: Bach, Vol. 4, No. 2 (APRIL, 1973), pp. 22-24
Published by: Riemenschneider Bach Institute
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41639892
Accessed: 05-06-2017 00:28 UTC

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted
digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about
JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
http://about.jstor.org/terms

Riemenschneider Bach Institute is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to
Bach

This content downloaded from 146.155.94.33 on Mon, 05 Jun 2017 00:28:52 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
 Performing Bach's Keyboard Music
Tempo
By George A. Kochevitsky
New York City

indications
IT indications IS a in his keyboard
well-known in hiscompositions.
fact keyboardWhen
that we consider
Sebastian the fact Bach left When only we a few consider actual the tempo fact
compositions.
that in the Baroque period such terms as "Allegro," "Vivace," "Largo," and
"Grave" served not so much to indicate an exact tempo as they did to
characterize a mood, we come to realize that Bach tempo indications are
few, indeed. Evidently, Bach felt that, for the performer who understood
the peculiarities of his style and grasped the essence of a given composi-
tion, tempo indications were unnecessary.

Bach's pupil, J. P. Kirnberger, stated in the "Preface" to his Recueil

d'airs de dance characteristiques (1777) that the performer should be
able to decide the character and the tempo of a piece "with the help of
the various types of notes that occur within the piece." Furthermore,
Kirnberger advised the performer who would become a good interpreter
to study all of the characteristic dances of the time.1

The modern harpsichordist, Isolda Ahlgrim, recommends that the

performer learn the steps of the various dances of past times by looking
through old illustrations and reading contemporary descriptions.2

One should, however, follow such suggestions with caution, since

both the tempo and the character of some dances have changed from
century to century and country to country. For example, the Sarabande
lost the vivid character which was one of its dominant characteristics at
the time of its origin; and the French Minuet which Sebastian Brossard,
writing in 1703, characterized as "very gay and very fast,"3 became by
mid-century, in the words of Denis Diderot, "noble and elegant . . . mod-
erate rather than quick."4 In short, one must know the history of the
origins and development of the dance and also be aware of both the age
and place of origin of any given dance piece in order to apply knowledge-
ably such suggestions as tempo determinants.

However, it is Kirnberger's sentence quoted above that suggests that

we look in a more appropriate direction for solutions to our Baroque
tempo problems.

From various performance practice books of the eighteenth century,

we know that note values were, as Erwin Bodky has stated, "a decisive

22

This content downloaded from 146.155.94.33 on Mon, 05 Jun 2017 00:28:52 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
factor in finding the right speed."5 The time signature, indicating the
number of time-units (beats) in the measure, together with the note
values (the shortest in the given piece are of special significance in this
connection) could designate the tempo desired by the composer.

A clear perception of the metrical units is essential. Is the time

signature equal to four quarters or eight eighths? Is a 6/8 signature
equal to two dotted-quarters or six eighths? If a pianist plays, for instance,
the piece with the time signature 2/4 feeling four beats (i.e., four
eighths) in each measure, would he play this piece somewhat slower than
if he feels only two beats (two quarters) ? All of this is true and deserves
our attention. Unfortunately, no one has yet developed this theory logi-
cally and substantially, and, because of our present lack of real understand-
ing of the theory, we are in danger of reaching absurd conclusions if we
try to follow it through to conclusion. (Such was the case with Fritz
Rothschild's The Lost Tradition in Music.)6

Nevertheless, in determining the tempo, it is the metro-rhythmical

relations which must be one of our main guide-posts. Other guide-posts
include a consideration of the texture of the composition ( i.e., How com-
plex is the polyphony? How rich is the embellishment?); and the flow
of the work (i.e., Does it progress steadily or are there frequent changes
in rhythmical patterns, in melodic direction, in harmonic progression, or
in density of the texture?). We must also add to these considerations an
understanding of the acoustics of the room in which the work is per-
formed and an awareness of the quality of the performance instrument.

Tempo, then, as Jorg Demus says, "... is not absolute but a relative
quantity," and it "depends much less on the objective-mathematical speed
than on the subjective feeling, which reveals the character of the compo-
sition/'7

Enrico Mainardi has said, "... the correct tempo is that which is
inconspicuous."8 How true! The tempo must be congruous with all other
elements of the interpretation.

As for the agogic inflections, it must be stated that no music requires

the constant observation of rigid tempo. The flow of Baroque music, like
that of the music of other eras, is subjected to slight fluctuations, reflecting
the breath of the live organism rather than the machine-like repetition of
the metronome's beat. These fluctuations make phrasings more compre-
hensible and clarify structural changes, thus serving the formal elements
no less than the emotional ones. They should, of course, be kept within
very delicate limits and used only con discrezione.

23

This content downloaded from 146.155.94.33 on Mon, 05 Jun 2017 00:28:52 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
 Footnotes

1 Yella Pessi quotes material from Kirnberger's "Preface" in her article, "Fren
Patterns and Their Reading in Bach's Secular Clavier Music," Papers of the
Annual Meeting of The American Musicological Society , 1941 , pp. 8-20. (Se
especially pp. 12-13 and p. 19.)
2 Isolda Ahlgrim and E. Fiale, "Zur Auffhrungspraxis der Bach' sehen Cemba
werke" sterreichische Musikzeitschrift, March, 1954.
3 Sebastian Brossard, Dictionaire de musique, Third edition (Amsterdam: Estien
Roger, c. 1715), p. 60.
4 Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d'Alembert, Encyclopdie, 36 vols, plus 3 vo
plates, 1751-1765 and 1772.
5 Erwin Bodky, The Interpretation of Bach's Keyboard Works (Cambridge, Ma
Harvard University Press, I960), p. 117.
6 See Arthur Mendel's review in The Musical Quarterly, XXXIX, (October, 195
pp. 617-630.
7 Jorg Demus, "Bach am Klavier," sterreichische Musikzeitschrift, January, 1954.
8 Enrico Mainardi, ber Bach-Interpretation," sterreichische Musikzeitschrift, Octo-
ber, 1954.

About Our Authors

Edna Kilgore recently completed her Ph. D. degree at The Catholic

University of America, presenting as her dissertation an exhaustive study,
"Metric Anomalies in the Well-Tempered Clavier

Julius Herford is professor emeritus of music at Indiana Univer-

sity. BACH will publish another article by Professor Herford in its July
issue.

George A. Kochevitsky, pianist, teacher, and author of articles

on piano performance, currently resides in New York City. BACH will
continue to publish articles from Dr. Kochevitsky s previously unpub-
lished manuscripts in future issues.

Randolph N. Currie, a doctoral student in musicology at The Ohio

State University, is also an instructor on the Newark campus of the
University and musical director of the Immaculate Conception Church,
Columbus.

24

This content downloaded from 146.155.94.33 on Mon, 05 Jun 2017 00:28:52 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms