UNDERGRADUATE
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MUSI2054 The Piano
Course Type: disciplinary elective for music majors/minors, free elective for others
Prerequisite: NIL
Instructor: Professor Giorgio BIANCOROSSO
Semester: First Semester 2025/26
Time: 4:00pm–5:50pm, Tuesday
Venue: CRT-11.01 Seminar Room
The course is open to all students with either some experience with or interest in the piano. Offering an overview of the history of the piano, the course unfolds as a series of snapshots of the personalities that were involved with the instrument as either performers or composers as well as the social and cultural milieus that provided the context for its extraordinary rise as arguably the most important instrument in the history of Western classical music. Students will be given the opportunity to study the piano as a medium of musical exploration and expression, the occasion for the display of virtuosity, a staple of the 19th-century bourgeois home, and an object of almost maniacal veneration. The course will end with an overview of the dissemination of the piano in East Asia.
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Course Learning Outcomes
Assessment Methods
Topics
Text & Resource Materials
Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to:
  • grasp the relationship between historical context, musical creativity, and technological changes in giving rise to and nurture the development of the most important instrument of the Western Classical tradition;
  • display some familiarity with some of the classics of the piano repertoire;
  • develop the ability to make informed judgements about piano performance.
In-class quizzes (50%)
Final Presentation (50%)
    1. Introduction: The Invention of the Piano
    2. Mozart’s Piano Concertos
    3. Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas: Audiences and Venues
    4. Piano Four Hands: Franz Schubert
    5. Public vs. Private: Robert and Clara Schumann
    6. Chopin
    7. Duets and Ensembles
    8. Performance as Composition: Franz Lisz
    9. The Piano Transfigured: Debussy and Ravel
    10. Virtuoso (I): Vladimir Horowitz
    11. Virtuosos (II): Glenn Gould and the Recording Studio
    12. Virtuosos (II): Glenn Gould and the Recording Studio
      General
      The Piano and Composers
      The Piano and Its Transformation
      The Fortepiano
      References
      Piano in cultures
      Pedagogy and Performance
      Brendel, Alfred, and Michael Morley. A Pianist's A to Z : A Piano Lover's Reader.2013.
      Rowland, and Rowland, David. The Cambridge Companion to the Piano.Cambridge Companions to Music. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
      Knize, Perri. Grand Obsession : A Piano Odyssey. 1st Scribner Hardcover ed.New York: Scribner, 2008.
      Williams, John-Paul. The Piano. London: Aurum Press, 2002.
      Wolcott, Michiko Ishiyama. Piano, the Instrument : An Annotated Bibliography. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2001.
      Gordon, Stewart. Beethoven's 32 Piano Sonatas : A Handbook for Performers. 2017.
      Schenker, Heinrich, and John Rothgeb. Beethoven's Last Piano Sonatas : AnEdition with Elucidation. 2015.
      Griffiths, Graham. Stravinsky's Piano : Genesis of a Musical Language. Musicsince 1900. Cambridge, UK ; New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
      Lederer, Victor. Beethoven's Piano Music : A Listener's Guide. Unlocking the Masters Series ; No. 23. Milwaukee, WI: Amadeus Press, 2011.
      Irving, John. Understanding Mozart's Piano Sonatas. Farnham, Surrey, England ; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2010.
      http://find.lib.hku.hk/record=HKU_IZ51498898990003414 ebook
      Howat, Roy. The Art of French Piano Music : Debussy, Ravel, Fauré, Chabrier. New Haven, Conn. ; London: Yale University Press, 2009.
      Berman, Boris. Prokofiev's Piano Sonatas : A Guide for the Listener and the Performer. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008.
      Kinderman, William. Mozart's Piano Music. Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press, 2006.
      Davidson, Michael. The Classical Piano Sonata : From Haydn to Prokofiev. London: Kahn & Averill, 2004.
      Irving, John. Mozart's Piano Concertos. Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2003.
      Nissman, Barbara. Bartók and the Piano: A Performer's View. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2002.
      Giordano, Nicholas J. Physics of the Piano. Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.
      Carew, Derek. The Companion to The Mechanical Muse: The Piano, Pianism and Piano Music, C.1760-1850. Aldershot, England ; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2007.
      Barron, James. Piano: The Making of a Steinway Concert Grand. 1st ed. NewYork: Times Books, 2006.
      Steinway, Theodore E. People and Pianos : A Pictorial History of Steinway & Sons. 3rd Ed.]. ed. S.l.] : Pompton Plains, N.J.: Classical Music Today ; Amadeus Press, 2005.
      Burnett, Richard., and William. Dow. Company of Pianos. Goudhurst, Kent,England: Finchcocks Press, 2004.
        De Silva, Streicher, Dieudonné, Schiedmayer, Streicher, Andreas, Dieudonné, Carl, and Schiedmayer, Johann David. The Fortepiano Writings of Streicher, Dieudonné, and the Schiedmayers : Two Manuals and a Notebook, Translated from the Original German, with Commentary. Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen Press,2008.
        Cole, Michael. The Pianoforte in the Classical Era. Oxford [England]: Clarendon Press, 1998.
          McGraw, Cameron, Christopher Fisher, Fisher, Katherine, and Anderson & Roe Piano Duo, Writer of Foreword. Piano Duet Repertoire : Music Originally Written for One Piano, Four Hands. Second ed. Indiana Repertoire Guides. 2016. Ebook
          Ellsworth, Therese Marie., and Susan. Wollenberg. The Piano in Nineteenth century British Culture : Instruments, Performers and Repertoire. Music in Nineteenth-century Britain. Aldershot, Hampshire, England ; Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2007.
          Hinson, Maurice., and Wesley. Roberts. The Piano in Chamber Ensemble : An Annotated Guide. 2nd ed. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006.
          Todd, R. Larry. Nineteenth-century Piano Music. 2nd ed. Routledge Studies in Musical Genres. New York: Routledge, 2004.
          Burge, David. Twentieth-century Piano Music. 1st Scarecrow Press Pbk. ed. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2004.
          Palmieri, Robert, and Palmieri, Margaret W. Piano : An Encyclopedia. 2nd ed. Encyclopedia of Keyboard Instruments (Routledge (Firm)). New York ; London: Routledge, 2003.
          Wright, H. Stephen. Film Music at the Piano : An Index to Piano Arrangements of Instrumental Film and Television Music in Anthologies and Collections. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2003.
          Dees, Pamela Youngdahl. A Guide to Piano Music by Women Composers. Music Reference Collection, No. 84, 86. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2002.
          Parakilas, James. Piano Roles : Three Hundred Years of Life with the Piano. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000.
            Waal, Rian De. Metamorphoses : The Art of the Virtuoso Piano Transcription. 2013.
            Santisi, Ray. Berklee Jazz Piano. Boston, MA : Milwaukee, Wis.: Berklee Press ; Distributed by Hal Leonard, 2009.
            Everett, Yayoi Uno., and Frederick. Lau. Locating East Asia in Western Art Music.1st ed. Music/culture. Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 2004.
            Alexander, Wade. Aural Piano Tuning : The Basic Knowledge and Skills Necesssary to Tune Pianos by Ear. 1st ed. Freeville, NY: Greystone Press, 2000.
            Kraus, Richard Curt. Pianos and Politics in China : Middle-class Ambitions and the Struggle over Western Music. New York: Oxford University Press, 1989.
              Swinkin, Jeffrey. Teaching Performance : A Philosophy of Piano Pedagogy. Contemporary Philosophies and Theories in Education ; Volume 7. 2015. ebook
              Hamilton, Kenneth. After the Golden Age : Romantic Pianism and Modern Performance. Oxford ; New York: Oxford University Press, 2008.
              Fraser, Alan, and Sonya. Ardan. The Craft of Piano Playing : A New Approach to Piano Technique. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2003.
              Chaffin, Imreh, Crawford, Imreh, Gabriela, and Crawford, Mary. Practicing Perfection : Memory and Piano Performance. Expertise, Research and Applications. Mahwah, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2002.
              http://find.lib.hku.hk/record=HKU_IZ51522179850003414 ebook
              Rowland, David. Early Keyboard Instruments : A Practical Guide. Cambridge Handbooks to the Historical Performance of Music. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
              http://find.lib.hku.hk/record=HKU_IZ51523822550003414 ebook