A Pianist’s A–Z is a book published in 2013 by the great Czech pianist Alfred Brendel. It is a collection of thoughts and reflections on music and the piano, organized in alphabetical order. For each letter, Brendel focuses on just a few terms, offering personal and often surprising observations.
Below is a brief account of this enjoyable read, with the thoughts that most struck and interested me.
A Pianist’s A-Z is not a dictionary in the strict sense of the word, nor does it claim to be encyclopedic. For example, under the letter B, only Bach, Beethoven, Balance (between the hands), Beginning (how to start a piece), and Brahms appear.
We thus discover that Brendel is in favor of performing Bach on the piano: he considers it an instrument capable of “singing” and making the polyphony that Bach had in mind clearer, even though he wrote for more primitive instruments.
Brendel reminds us of Beethoven’s tender and gentle side, far from the exclusively heroic and emphatic image. He confesses that he prefers musicians who let the music ‘float’ upwards, rather than those who insist on heavy basses.
Brendel’s favorite composer is Chopin, who, according to him, drew inspiration almost exclusively from the piano. Brendel observes that his music is often reduced to mere virtuosity, thus losing its poetic dimension. For him, Chopin’s 24 Preludes Op.28 represent one of the highest peaks of piano literature.
Brendel’s thoughts are erratic, sharp, and often witty. In addition to comments on the great composers, piano players will in these pages find practical advice familiar to every teacher: for example, the importance of choosing a suitable fingering and sticking to it.
Brendel has a gift for synthesis: he states that pianists must learn from singers—to “sing all the notes”—and from conductors, paying attention to the balance between the parts. And he reminds us that it is not necessary to “go out of time” to play with emotion.
With contagious passion, Brendel also stresses the comic dimension of music, not just the tragic one. And he’s not just talking about vocal music: instrumental music can also be ironic or funny. In his opinion, for example, Beethoven’s Diabelli Variations Op. 120 are a comic work by choice of the composer himself.
Brendel loves paradoxes: he argues that Mozart’s sonatas are “too easy for a child, but too difficult for a mature artist.” He can also be poetic, as when he writes that “music is already alive in the score, but dormant: it is up to the performer to awaken it.” An image of rare beauty.
Sometimes his thoughts condense into true aphorisms:
Silence is the foundation of music. We find it before, after, within, beneath, and behind music. Some pieces emerge from silence, others lead to it.
Brendel also knows how to make people smile. He recounts, for example, a concert in Australia performed on a terrible piano: at the end, he thanked the audience… asking for an axe to destroy the instrument!
I liked this book because it is light, witty, and accessible, and it talks about music with simplicity without ever trivializing it. Brendel, who has explored the piano repertoire with depth and rigor, manages here to talk about it with intimacy and naturalness.
The text can also be read as a “listening guide”: the author cites and illuminates with his observations a large number of works. For example, he explains that for him it would be inconceivable to open a concert with Beethoven’s Sonata Op. 111, because as it is the last of the 32 sonatas, “after her there must only be silence.”
Brendel concludes his essay with irony:
“Zvonomit. Legendary medieval king of the Croats. His connection to music, and to this alphabet, is, at best, peripheral.”
With this gentle mockery, the great pianist seems to remind us that we should never take ourselves too seriously—not even when it comes to art. Perhaps this is the last, precious lesson that Brendel wants to leave us with.