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January 27, 2009
Toy Piano?
Why compose for a toy? Why not use the real thing?
When considering whether or not to use the toy piano, these two questions haunted me for a long time. Then I came across one in a Nordstrom one day while my girlfriend was shopping and asked,” Why use the real piano when I can use this?” Since I was already considering writing a percussion piece and then a solo trumpet piece, I decided to combine the two projects and add toy piano. Although it is tuned to A440, the metal bars in it produce quite a different sound that has a lot of potential in an ensemble of equal tempered instruments (pitched percussion, trumpet). By accepting this as a tool instead of a limitation, one could produce very dense textures as well as thin, hollow textures by pairing it with other instruments or having it play a solo section.
Using the toy piano in conjunction with the pitched percussion instruments and trumpet will (hopefully) activate other partials and overtones not usually perceived otherwise. I am hoping the different timbres will produce waves that will add and subtract from each other in unique ways. After hearing John Cage’s Suite for Toy Piano, it gave me the idea to approach melodic writing in a rhythmically diverse and almost virtuosic manner and contrasting that idea by including static, colorful harmonies to give the piece a chance to breathe. So far this approach is working extremely well to provide a natural ebb and flow for the piece globally. By assigning the role of “punctuation” to the toy piano, it has created a natural pace to the piece as well as to the process of actually writing it. So far, I’ve completed about one minute in this manner.
While I was researching the toy piano as an instrument, I came across toypiano.org,a site dedicated to providing information to further knowledge on the toy as an instrument. You can find links to composers and performers who use them. I would also recommend listening to Cage’s Suite for Toy Piano. It’s early Cage and it has some great writing in it.
Originally posted by admin from Ryan Manchester, ReBlogged by newmusicrebloggers on Jan 27, 2009 at 01:42 PM