# Composing 4-Hand Piano Music



## danielr50 (Jul 3, 2010)

Why don't more of Today's Composers who are looking for a way to demonstrate their compositional talent try their hand at composing 4-Hand Piano Music?

It offers scope for some of the greatest technical sophistication in all of music. It also offers a great scope for harmonic complexity. In particular, it makes hypnotically "full" and "rich" sounding harmonies possible. It also allows melodies to have brilliant shimmering effects along the higher octaves with the use of 2 hand legato, (think of Chopin's music with 6ths, 3rds, octaves, and 10ths being played in perfect legato).

However, classical music has been particularly unfair to this form, mainly due to the egos of pianists. The classical repertiore (and all of music) is serioulsy lacking in this department. Except for Brahms' 21 Hungarian dances for 4 hands, Mozart's double piano sonata, and Mozart's double piano conerto, it mainly consists of pieces by Brahms, Mozart, and Schubert, which are not exactly the best.

Fortunately for all of us, the days of the soloist limiting the composer are over. Ever since I transitioned from being a pianist, organist, and woodwind soloist into becoming a composer whose primary focus is the production of digital recordings, I no longer need two live pianists for my 4 hand pieces to be heard. But perhaps more importantly, others can directly hear why it's important rather than just be told that it's important.

I would strongly encourage any ambitious composers out there to give 4-hand piano composition a try. You might need the assistance of a digital keyboard that allows you to record and layer two separate tracks, since it is extremely difficult to get a feel for composing music with "monster" chords if you are not used to hearing them. But I always remain very curious about all the musical ideas other composers can dream up for the 4 hand piano form.


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