bars.

[Fred Sturm]

Just to expand and be more specific as to some places a D won't work for
Voice of the Whale (which I performed a couple months ago on a Steinway
A - the only available house piano in the venue - so have a recent
memory of the problem spots). The most prominent places where a D/B/A
won't work are
1) Second movement (Theme, I think called "Sea-Time"). The octaves with
included 5th held silently by left hand while strummed by right include
F2 and F#2 as upper notes. These are, of course, on the other side of
the break, so are practically speaking impossible to include in the
strum. And the highest note is part of the theme, hence absolutely
essential.
2) Last movement (Coda, something about "End of Time"). At the beginning
of this movement there are several three note clusters (adjacent
semitones) played by the left hand while the right touches nodes at the
5th partial - just beyond the dampers. A couple of these nodes are
inaccessible on the D/B/A. Also, toward the end, the final echo of the
tympani from Also Sprach Zarathustra requires a similar touching of
inaccessible nodal points. And it's one of the highlights of the whole
piece, IMO.
	There are a couple other spots, but this should be enough to make the
point to a doubter that a D is definitely not the right instrument for
Crumb, even if he is a distinguished guest and "therefore worthy of the
best the venue has to offer."
Regards,
Fred

Fred Sturm wrote:
> 
> I'll just repeat here what I have written a couple times previous, and
> which others have confirmed. Crumb's music for inside the piano was
> written at the model L in his office. The layout of the strings
> (particularly the bass break) makes many of his effects specific to this
> or similar model pianos (eg, Steinway M, Baldwin M). A model D (or A or
> B) Steinway is problematic for many effects. So if it were me, I would
> inform the powers that be (starting lower on the totem pole with piano
> faculty, and pointing out in a couple scores how this is so - Vox
> Balaenae and Makrokosmos are good) that an alternate piano would serve
> the purpose better. (And, BTW, it is likely that a small Yamaha or Kawai
> might _not_ be a good alternate, due to cross struts at the far side of
> the dampers. Makes it hard to obtain 5th partials and to do "chisel on
> the strings" among other problems).
>