ACCENT
Accents over individual notes and chords were marked with fp and sfp by composers
during the early classical period. It was only later that the inverted V for a strong accent
and a sideways V for a light accent came to be in more general use. It is often hard to tell
from Chopin’s markings in his autograph manuscripts whether a sideways V is intended
to be an accent or a diminuendo. Schumann’s use of accent marks was curious as on
occasion he used them over every note of a melodic line.
In piano playing the pianist normally inserts an accent on the first beat of each bar in 3/
or 4/4 time. In a mazurka there is a secondary accent on the second or third beat of each
bar, or each second bar, depending on the particular mazurka. In alla breve time there are
considered to be two beats in the bar not four.
A slight lingering on a note or chord is called an agogic accent. This is the meaning of at
least some of the light accent marks in Chopin. Rachmaninoff used the small sostenuto
line to indicate an agogic accent.
ACTION
A piano action is the mechanism between the keys and the strings that controls how the
piano responds to key pressure.
The action of a piano has to:
! cause the hammer to strike the string when the key is depressed;! allow the hammer to rebound whether the key is held down or not;! stop the string from vibrating when the key is released;! yield a wide range of volume from variations in key pressure; and! permit immediate repetition of the entire cycle.Cristofori was the first person to devised a mechanism that could do all of these things.
The way the piano responds when it is played is also called the ‘action’.
ALBERT D’
Eugen d’Albert (1864-1932) pianist, composer, conductor and pupil of Liszt, was born in
Glasgow on 10 April 1864 and died while on tour in Riga, Latvia, on 3 March 1932. He
was of French and German descent as well as being a descendent of Domenico Alberti
who invented the Alberti bass. His father, a pupil of Kalkbrenner, was ballet master at
Covent Garden. D’Albert studied at the National Training School in London with Pauer,