Word: keyboard
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Brown was the superb soloist in two sonatas for recorder and basso continuo (viol and keyboard) by Handel and Telemann--the two competitors for the top Trendex rating when Bach was generally considered a negligible talent. The first movement of the Telemann was a good example of the Baroque convention of using descending chromatic scale fragments to express sadness. In both works, Miss Olson's viol was far too weak, although she was fine in her two solo recercadas by Ortiz. In Baroque music, the bass line cannot be too strong...
Gould practices some broad eccentricities-he is likely to bundle up in overcoat and muffler in the hottest weather; he usually soaks his hands and arms in hot water before he begins to play. His fussiness about pianos is legendary-once he insisted that the keyboard had to be lowered one twenty-fifth of an inch. He sings off key while he is playing. "The piano is basically a percussive instrument, and the performer must imitate the vocal inflection," Gould explains...
...Freeman chose another chestnut, Rachmaninoff's Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. This piece, with its viscous melody in the middle, is a musical hodge-podge. It serves mostly as a showpiece for pianists, and Freeman gave it a truly virtuoso performance. He showed a wily mastery of the keyboard that partially hid the banality of the music...
Another machine Skinner has conceived would have a card-puncher and keyboard, possibly containing all the letters of the alphabet and all the numbers, which could be used to teach spelling, arithmetic, and, perhaps, other subjects. But its design would have to be left to engineers. Skinner will not attempt it himself...
...that half century he has grown from a prodigy to a musical playboy to a great artist with the broadest popular following of any front-rank musician in the world. The compact dignity of his entrances, his ramrod back and frizzled grey crown, his highhanded hammering of the keyboard are known and loved wherever there are pianos...