"Hardly any of them sang," says Burnside. After all, the great Lieder and song composers were pianists." This is a good point: think of Schubert, Schumann, Brahms, Wolf, Fauré and Debussy. "I always think of what my mentor, Eric Sams, said – that the whole song repertoire is a piano art form rather than a singer's. Iain Burnside, another seasoned accompanist, agrees. But is anyone really listening to what these toiling accompanists are doing? As pianist Anna Tilbrook – who plays for, among others, tenor James Gilchrist – puts it: "These songs would sound pretty strange without the piano." You would have thought that, by now, musical culture would have twigged that there's more to a song recital than the singer. Well, there's a great deal more to it than that." He looks so slender and shy and so modest that people think he's there just to do what he's told, to follow the singer through thick and thin. The most enchanting lady walks on to sing, and all the ladies look at her because of what she's wearing, and all the men look at her because – well, all the men look at her. But I would like people to realise what extremely important people we accompanists are. "We accompanists," Moore said in his 1960s recording The Unashamed Accompanist, "have our minds above such mundane things as fees. The archetypal British accompanist was Gerald Moore, who lamented his plight just as passionately as Vignoles, despite the fact that he was assisting the likes of Elizabeth Schwarzkopf. How would he sum up his craft? "I sometimes describe it as the art of getting what you want without the other person noticing." Vignoles will still be on the piano, of course, but for once it's his baby, his name in lights. #Find an accompanist series#Billed as a showcase of song that will celebrate the relationship between pianist and singer, the series features such sopranos as Joan Rodgers and Sandrine Piau. "That's what I'm staying for/ That's what I'm playing for/ Art is calling for – me!" And later: "You may think this job sucks/ When they get all the bucks/ Forget their lines, transpose/ And jump from page to page!"Īfter four decades at the top of his profession, however, Vignoles is finally getting to call the shots, having curated a series of eight concerts at the Wigmore Hall in London. "I only make believe I'm following their Lieder," he sings. It's a life that Roger Vignoles, the veteran British accompanist who has worked with everyone from Kiri Te Kanawa to Anne Sofie Von Otter, laments in his hilarious song The Battle Hymn of the Accompanist. The singers couldn't do it without them, but it's the braying sopranos and the yodelling tenors who get all the glory, as well as most of the cash and applause – despite the fact that all they've done is sing a few tunes, usually in a foreign language, while the pianists slog their guts out playing fiendishly difficult accompaniments by Schubert, Schumann or Britten. Being the pianist who plays for them can feel like the most thankless job in music. Just and I'll reply as soon as possible.P ity the poor accompanist, condemned to sit in the shadow of the great voices and the even greater egos of today's singers. You may ask me anything you like about the website and its tracks, either before or after making a purchase. See what a difference these mp3 accompaniment tracks can make to your music practice! Read these hundreds of Testimonials to see what other customers have said over the years. Slow Down, Speed Up, Change Pitch, Create Practice Loops - all tracks can be used within specialised apps to create your own personal practice routines. and dozens more of your favourite composers. Practise with mp3 backing tracks for the great works by Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Debussy, Dvorak, Elgar, Faure, Grieg, Handel, Haydn, Hindemith, Kreisler, Mendelssohn, Mozart, Poulenc, Prokofiev, Rachmaninov, Saint-Saens, Sarasate, Schubert, Schumann, Shostakovich, Tchaikovsky, Vivaldi, Weber. Listen to these extended samples to see why many musicians consider them to be the best classical accompaniment tracks available on the web! They are recorded with tremendous care, containing all the accelerandos, rits and pauses you expect, while still being note-perfect! Faster works even come with slower practice versions. Includes many of the great sonatas and concertos written for these instruments, as well as lots of attractive smaller works.Īll works are recorded by a professional, experienced piano accompanist. Practise your classical instrumental music with high-quality piano accompaniment play-along tracks available on this website.Īccompaniments for over 600 major classical works are available, for violin, viola, cello, flute, oboe, clarinet, horn and trumpet.
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