Apps in the Music Studio: Review The Liszt Sonata by Touchpress
Liszt Sonata in B Minor (for iPad)
by TouchPress
The theory of hypertext writing is rather like opening a puzzle box and continually discovering new surprises and layers of material. With this excellent Touchpress iPad app, the Liszt Sonata in B minor becomes an explorer’s paradise.
Touchpress are not averse to creating material relating to seminal
cultural artefacts. T.S. Eliot’s ‘The Waste Land’ and Beethoven’s’ 9th Symphony’ are two more works which have been studied, assimilated, performed and filmed for the presentation of these apps.
There are many ways to explore this app and its information. A sound starting point is probably the versatile split screen performance by Stephen Hough. For those unfamiliar with the process, by touching the
different parts of the screen, different aspects may be watched: a side-on performance, a bird’s eye view performance and a BeatMap— modern-day neumatic notation— all of which can be viewed while following the score in its entirety (for non-musicians there is a
moving line to help follow the score).
The real beauty for pianists and piano teachers in particular, is the thoughtful perspective from which Hough is filmed – almost a page-turner’s view on the treble side. I can’t recall such fine filming of a
performance; the details of every moment at the keyboard are captured so that every gesture, every piece of fingering is able to be seen. In combination with the score, the film is a tremendously useful aide to
understanding the technique and musicianship of the performance. And let’s not beat around the bush, as the old Australian adage goes, this
is a superlative performance. I used Beats Audio headphones and found the clarity and quality of the sound excellent.
The app doesn’t stop there either; in fact, it is just the beginning of an in-depth historical, social, structural and biographical analysis of Liszt’s Sonata which exploits the rather titanic intellect of Stephen Hough to
excellent effect in this type of format.
I think it would be easy to spend many hours absorbed in the immersive experience of this app. If this is the future of edutainment, we are indeed privileged to welcome this bright future. Kudos goes to Touchpress
for this fine addition to Lisztian understanding, applicable to both the connoisseur and dilettante alike.
Verdict: 10/10
Available in the iTunes store.
by Helen O'Brien - Editor of Music & the Teacher.
First published in Music and the Teacher 2013-2, Quarterly Journal of the Victorian Music Teachers' Association.
