Historical Piano Portfolio

I am writing to seek admission to the Historical Piano Summer Academy 2018 at the Orpheus Institute. I am very interested in participating in this ten-day program and further exploring my interest in historical instruments and performance practice. This program will enhance my knowledge and allow me to study and perform on pianos built during the era that corresponds to my Classical and early Romantic repertoire. As a piano performance major with a minor in early music, I have been exposed to various pieces composed during the Classical and Baroque era and personally encountering these original and copied instruments would help me succeed in gaining insight into the composer’s intentions as well as the sound that may have been intended. I will

Examining Mozart as a keyboardist would also require an exploration into his role as an organist and if his early encounter and training in this instrument influenced his decision to add a pedalboard to his piano. When discussing Mozart as a keyboardist, little attention has been devoted to how influential his training and interest was as an organist. I argue that Mozart’s keyboard style was very much influenced by the organ’s characteristics. Analyzing his compositions may reveal his continued reference to organ literature. Although the originality of Mozart’s piano is under debate since it has been altered in many ways since his death, the now missing pedalboard is well documented. This fact questions the originality of the damper-raising knee levers in Mozart’s piano. Simply, if the feet are busy playing the pedals, is it still possible to raise the damper rail with the knee? An answer may be offered by the hand stops in Mozart’s piano for operating the dampers. To support my argument, Variation IV of Mozart’s “alla Turca” Sonata K. 331 reveal three textural layers that can be conveniently played on the pedal piano using the feet for the bass and the hands for the treble. Further, a hand will be free to reactivate the hand stops and lift the damper rail, thus allowing the pianist to re-orient the listener from the preceding minor variation to the current variation in