MusicOnline UK Teaching Notes - ABRSM Piano 2019/20 Grade 7 - B2

Lied ohne Worte No.3

Felix Mendelssohn

ABRSM Grade 7 Piano 2019/2020. B2

Teaching Notes

This delightful scherzo like piece is an excellent for you to display your staccato technique. Although very little staccato is actually marked it can be assumed to apply to all quavers throughout, unless specifically marked slurred. However, be careful to differentiate between such staccato quavers and the longer crotchets. A very light a relaxed wrist is essential for a "presto" execution and the forward driving presto  pulse will be further helped by a slight accent on the first beat of each bar. This is particularly applicable to sections such as bar 9 where the first quaver chord of the LH would be a falling motion towards the keyboard and the second of each pair more like a rebound off the first. Similarly in the RH, the two note slurs should be thought of as one movement, falling onto the first note and lifting off the second.

The general dynamic of this playful number is piano. That does not mean that there is no room for dynamic shaping within the phrases. For example, listen carefully again, to the opening phrase and notice how the dynamic rises to the 4th bar. The recapitulation in bar 32 is marked piano and would be arrived at such by the  dim from bar 28. However, if you listen again to the above performance you will notice an extra drop in dynamic in bar 32, in addition to what would have been arrived at after the diminuendo  as if to emphasise the fact that the recapitulation has started.

The page turn in the ABRSM edition was performed a bar early (in bar 42 and memorising bar 43), since here, the LH has more "free time".

Also notice that the lower written RH notes in the ABRSM book bar 53, are played here with the LH (the first of which is doubled in both hands anyway).

Finally, make sure you finish very delicately maybe even adding una corda for the final 7 bars.