Pianist

For the passionate players, or early beginners, Pianist magazine will teach you the art of piano playing through professional advice, sheet music and lessons for all levels. Your piano playing journey starts here with the magazine that doubles as an entertaining read and the ultimate interactive piano teacher. Read, learn and play the piano with Pianist magazine every issue. Improve your piano playing and perfect your tone with 40 pages of specially selected sheet music. Whether it’s reading fascinating industry articles or putting your fingers to work with beautiful sheet music, you’ll be playing like an expert in no time with a digital subscription to Pianist magazine!

Role play

Your chance to HAVE YOUR SAY • EMAIL: editor@pianistmagazine.com WRITE TO: The Editor, Pianist, Warners Group Publications,The Maltings, West St, Bourne, PE10 9PH. Letters may be edited.

Real-time revolution • Erica Worth travelled to Hamburg in October to see and hear one Steinway & Sons piano broadcast to another, in real time, through the magic of Spiriocast

CATE BLANCHETT INSIDE THE MUSIC • For her new role as a powerful but fragile conductor, the Australian actor relished the chance to learn the piano. Erica Worth meets her and the film’s director, Todd Field

IT’S NEVER TOO L ATE TO IMPROVE YOUR SIGHT-READING • The fear of sight-reading lurks within the depths of most amateur pianists’ psyche. Mark Tanner shows you how to become a master of your own sight-reading destiny

REVISITING SOME PIANO RULES: FINGERINGS FOR LEGATO & REPEATED NOTES • Playing with a comfortable fingering can make all the difference, says Graham Fitch. Here he addresses the myth of finger legato plus ways to make repeated-note playing more manageable

THE SCORES

SCHALE MINUET IN C MAJOR • A deceptively simple-looking piece, this effervescent dance will need good articulation and thoughtful use of dynamics, says Melanie Spanswick

FRANCK ARR . BAUER PRÉLUDE FROM PRÉLUDE, FUGUE ET VARIATION OP 18 • It’s all about understanding the original organ work, says Nils Franke, in Harold Bauer’s clever transcription of Franck ’s haunting Prélude movement

HÉLÈNE DE MONTGEROULT ETUDE NO 110 • Who’d have guessed the composer of this glorious étude was a contemporary of Mozart? Its intricate, Romantic writing is way ahead of its time, says Montgeroult champion Clare Hammond

HANS-GÜNTER HEUMANN BEGINNERS KEYBOARD CLASS

Janette MASON & James THOMPSON

Melanie SPANSWICK

Christian Friedrich SCHALE (1713-1800)

Giovanni Battista PESCETTI (c.1704-1766)

Alfred TOFFT (1865-1931)

César FRANCK (1822-1890)

Robert SCHUMANN (1810-1856)

Franz LISZT (1811-1886)

Selim PALMGREN (1878-1951)

Wolfgang Amadeus MOZART (1756-1791)

François COUPERIN (1668-1733)

François COUPERIN (1668-1733) arr. Harold BAUER (1873-1951)

Hélène de MONTGEROULT (1764-1836)

PIANO TEACHER HELP DESK • Kathryn Page on how to develop confident independence for all our students

HEALTHY PRACTICE Everything you need to know • Last issue, Warwick Thompson addressed the subject of coping to play with an injury: Here, Penelope Roskell shows us how to avoid trouble-free music-making, so that our precious fingers will remain in working order for years to come

César Franck at 200 • When Chenyin Li recorded the arrangement of Franck’s Prélude Op 18 for this issue’s album, she loved it so much she decided to add it to her regular repertoire. Which begs the question: why isn’t Franck’s music already more firmly in the canon? To celebrate the 200th anniversary of his birth, Warwick Thompson takes a closer look at a fascinating composer

SEAL OF APPROVAL • A maker can...