Howard FergusonKeyboard Interpretation From the 14th to the 19th Century: An Introduction

This is an absolute gem of a book. I am preparing for a performance diploma, playing a lot of Bach, and this book has been invaluable. It is very scholarly and detailed but easy to understand at the same time. It really should be on every pianist's shelf!

Excellent in every way.

great little book

This is a very useful book, packed with information, but it is not a book to be taken as the absolute truth and accepted uncritically. Ferguson was obviously a good musician, a music lover and very erudite. But in common with many musicians of his era he presumes to have the final and certain truth on many matters that are not so clear, and he presumes to tell us how we must play, rather than offering us options.He also has a bad habit of presenting his personal opinion as if it were the result of a law of nature that is binding on us all, and sometime he is just wrong, and gives bad advice. For example, on page 65 he gives the example of the opening of Mozart;'s Fantasia in D minor (K 397) and has this to say: " Tenuto touch - the holding down of notes for longer than their written value - is at times just as necessary in classical piano music as in earlier harpsichord works. A good instance is the opening of Mozart's Fantasia in D minor, k 397. where the broken chords in bb. 1-6 would sound absurdly dry if they were not sustained until the end of the bar"Well, it might sound "absurdly dry" to Mr. Ferguson, and most professional pianists seem to agree with him as they all hold down the notes longer than their written values, or add pedal. I prefer to credit Mozart with enough intelligence to write exactly what he wants. In this piece he has gone to great lengths to meticulously notate the exact lengths of each note. Of course a performer has complete liberty to do what they want. But I prefer to hold the notes for exactly the lengths that Mozart notated. The "absurd" dryness and the emptiness of the bare octaves that continue to sound through each measure then create a very different effect to the finger-pedalled, romanticised mush that Ferguson prefer, and I think it is the effect that Mozart wanted to create. This is just one example, possibly the worst, but there are many more examples of Ferguson his personal choices as if they were somehow the absolute truth and binding on us all.What I object to is the devious way that Ferguson tries to get your agreement by the insinuation that what he prefers is obvious and therefore that you are dim if you cannot see it too. But I do not think he was aware that he was being devious or manipulative. It is just the way that people thought prior to WWII. A certain lack of humility and excess of hubris that we see even more strongly in such "luminaries" as Donald Francis Tovey.So in summary, this is a very useful and informative book, but it has to be read critically, and not with undue respect for the author, no matter how great his reputation.

This is a little-known gem which every keyboardist needs. Ferguson takes information from many important sources and culls it down into the essentials of interpretation, making it an essential reference.

This book is an essential book in a piano teacher's library. It is informative, clearly set out and well indexed.

I am teaching a course on keyboard literature and this book introduced many new things as well as a great review.

Keyboard Interpretation is not waht I would call bedside reading material! The book is an invaluable reference for the dedicated keyboard musician, especially in the area of alternate fingering possibilities, rhythmic executions, phrasing, and articulation. The chapter on ornamentation, broken down by country, is extremely practical and useful. The chapter on 'pianist's problems' relating to the transfer of earlier works to the modern piano is worth the price of the book. I highly recommend this book to all pianists and organists who care!