Added: 4 years ago
From: ecomparone
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  • Dracula approves!

  • @pimppastorjj LOL !

  • does anyone have the music sheet to this???

  • " I myself constructed a keyboard score based on my pet dog's theme. "LOL

  • keyboard cat, is the descendant of the the cat who made this wonderful piece

  • She's a harpsicord genius!

  • This is by far the best rendition of this piece I have heard so far. The twisting and pulling tempo somehow makes me want to tear my hair out (in delight)

  • Your interpretation is monumental!!!!!!!!!

  • "The" by the way

  • This piece has an interesting history. By Liszt's time it was already ancient and had been completely forgotten. It might never have survived but for the fact that he found a rare copy and included it in his piano repertoire in 1838. It caused a sensation as no-one had heard it. It triggered a whole wave of fashion for antique pieces.

  • She is epic!

  • Magnificent. Thank you very much..

  • Magnificent. Absolutely brilliant.

  • She's a GODESS! 

  • Try listening to it while watching leaves fall from a sun lit tree.

  • A standing harpsichord Oo seen it all now...

  • I totally read it as "The Cat's Fudge", haha. Great playing none the less.

  • Mme Comparone plays inCOMPARably....and yes, Signor Scarlatti had an extremely talented gatto...

  • Mme Comparone plays inCOMPARably....

  • You are such a joy to hear!

  • Does anybody know, which Scarlatti is this? Domenico?

  • @Oneirocrates You are correct. Domenico Scarlatti.

  • @kyled137 Thank You!

  • Guys please keep the comments respectful, Elaine reads them

  • Words cannot explain how much of a wonderful musician she is. I am only 15 and she has inspired me so much

  • @harpsinth Well... since you sound so knowledgeable of her videos and playing habits, why do you bother to watch? And for that matter, why comment?

  • @NixiandFaunus

    just to bore you dumb fans too...hahahaha...

  • @NixiandFaunus No doubt. She's got some rather articulate and deliberate ornamentation going on for an "angry elephant."

  • Comment removed

  • @harpsinth your comment is "boring". And you yourself seem like an "angry elephant." I can't stand UPTIGHT NIT-PICKY SOUR CRITICS.... maybe she could go more delicate in some spots, but to totally totally trash her and her playing, like you're doing? uncalled for, and a bit schmucky....... just sayin. (And it makes YOU lose credibility, when you're THAT uptight and negative and rude....even if you might have a slight point somewhere, it gets lost in your overly negative nonsense.)

  • @MuscleSculptor =

    you are quite right...sorry for that.

  • @harpsinth it's no big sweat... but I just thought of something. I was wondering how she could really go "delicate" when playing on a harpsichord? Unless I'm mistaken there is no touch response on a harpsichord. It's not a "piano-forte". Meaning that no matter how hard or soft she hits the keys or plays, won't it always sound the same way anyway? That's why Cristofori invented the "piano (forte)", so there could be variation in power and volume, etc. So how can you do that on a harpsichord?

  • @MuscleSculptor = But that´s the point ! Performance on harpsichord is made subtlety and delicacy. Playing hard only causes the plectra to be broken, and the wires to sound harsh. How to obtain minimum dynamics in such an instrument ? "So simple": just play with delicacy exploring the registers and rich combinations of timbre of the harpsichord. (good musicians do this since XVI century. Dynamics may be emulated in live eperformance only by "intention" and breathing of a good performer.

  • @MuscleSculptor @MuscleSculptor That´s the point ! Performance on harpsichord is made subtlety and delicacy. Playing hard only causes the plectra to be broken, and the wires to sound harsh. How to obtain minimum dynamics in such an instrument ? Just play with delicacy exploring the registers and rich combinations of timbre of the harpsichord. (good musicians do this since XVI century). In live performance Dynamics can be simulated by "intention" and breathing of a good performer.

  • @MuscleSculptor You are right that playing hard or soft does not change the dynamics, but that is the purpose of having two keyboards. As you can see she is playing the quieter notes on the top keyboard. Definitely not as dynamic as the piano though.

  • @MuscleSculptor harpsinth made a similar comment about Elaine on her "Hornpype" video. If you don't like a performer, why keep watching her videos to complain about them? I called him on his rudeness, he left a vulgar comment for me, and sent another one to me personally that was laced with obscenities and sexual references. I have no problem with video criticism, but don't understand the need for people like him (who otherwise leaves perfectly thoughtful comments) to be mean or rude to Elaine.

  • @harpsinth Another implies you have watched more than one. If it is so horrible, why do you keep watching?

  • Excellent.

  • why the standard tuning of an harpsicord is under the 440 hertz?

    I apologize for my ignorance, but i'd like to know the reason. Thank you!

  • @ImperoRomano this is a baroque instrument, the standard tuning during that period was lower... I forgot the exact tuning, but baroque tuning is below 440 hertz...

  • @TempoFurioso I believe that it is 432 hertz :)

  • @Meestercheese  ooh... thanks for reminding my rusting memory... ho ho ho

  • It will be very tired if I have to stand for performing the whole piece. Good playing!  Clear contrapuntal lines.

  • That hole story about the title is completly false!!

    Scarlatti fooled around the keyboard and pulled out the theme. It was his cat who developed subjects countersubjects and the elements of the fugue with that theme. Cats nowadays cant write like that.

  • @leandrusi I could believe that! Once in a while, one of my cats will walk on my unfinished harpsichord and hit a few of the working notes... it sounds like the first few mysterious notes of a fugue :)

  • @tnovelli77 y unfinished ?

  • @leandrusi . Cats aren´t what they used to be (sigh!)

  • @metteholm75 : but they are

  • @leandrusi mieow 

  • @leandrusi Well I know Buttercup our youngest could never write a wonderful melodie such as this. She just like the sun and sweet kitty treats.

  • @leandrusi no cats could EVER write! No matter how evolution or creation dictates

  • @cocokitty55 you´r just saying that, cocoKITTY ;D

  • @leandrusi My cat can actually. Not joking. But then again, she is over 200 years old; she actually moved us to the Baroque period of music.

  • @leandrusi Wait untill they evolve to opposable thumb ;-)

  • @leandrusi Yeah, kitties these days hang out on streets getting high on catnip. You can't even get them to vacume much less improvise on the harpsichord!  :-D

  • @leandrusi Yes they can! Cats these days know we are watching them with cameras and camcorders and so are much more careful. 

  • :) I am playing this for a performance on may 8th

  • you know how he wrote this right? he put his cat on his keyboard, and called it, and it made this theme as it walked on the keys.

  • @MasterMorty Muzio Clementi invented that story, - but I admit, that it sounds very much like my cat taking a stroll on my harpsicord :D

  • All wonderful, mastery rendering of the fugue. Plus Cat walk tempo sounds indeed so perfect to my ears. Thank you for this inspiring interpretation!

    *

  • In Castlevania games appears a lot of fugues

  • @cochinofeo Actually, I haven't heard any yet. Though they did use Bach's Chromatic Fantasia in one game (CV2 Belmont's Revenge I think) and Michiru Yamane did write a C-minor organ chaconne for Nocturne in the Moonlight that sounds like Bach's C minor organ passacaglia.

  • yeah ...come fight ... bring your equipments !!!

  • is there other music by D.Scarlatti besides the sonatas.Or is this the Father's fugue?

  • This fugue is included in the collection of Sonatas. Most of the 555 Sonatas are in binary form but a few fugues are included plus 1 or 2 pieces in variation form. Dominico composed much besides keyboard pieces including cantatas etc.

  • Is it just me or does early videogame (8-bit, in particular) songs sound just like this?

    By the way: most likely she's standing up *not* because of freedom or to reach notes, but because, as some people said, she might be trying to be historically accurate: you would originally play harpsichord standing up.

  • Really? I didn't know that, so i'm not going to question it, but if it's historical accuracy we are talking here why isn't she using the 415 tuning? And why is she playing Scarlatti on a harpsichord hammering as if she was playing Liszt on a piano?

  • @daniluzzu On a harsichord it does not matter how hard you press the keys, the volume is the same. That is why there are two manuals. A loud and a soft one. You can create the effect of "accents" and such, by breaking the sound before it.

  • prefer Bach, great music nonetheless

  • Elaine plays the fugue wonderfully! Her interpretation made me love the piece, so much that I bought the score and tried it out on my own haprsichord (a replica of a C17 Dutch Ruckers instrument). But when I played it I was in for a great surprise: from bar 134 on there follows a number of beautiful dissonant chords, in fact the most beautiful dissonant chords I have ever heard! But they simply aren't there in her interpretation as she plays the piece too fast. And so she does the last 6 bars.

  • alright check this out... if you think they are beautifu they are consonant to you.. beatiful dissonance is a contradiction. where there chords like major 7ths minor seconds ? because consonance and dissonance are IMO an opinion.... not trying to be a dick though

  • Hi Elaine, very beautiful interpretation! i would like to study this fugue on piano, what is the best score edition to buy in your opinion?

    Thanks for your advise,

    Carlo

  • beautiful

  • Not to mention this particular piece is a total b**** to play with all the voices and awkward fingerings on fast dual lines, moving notes on one half of your hand while trilling on the other... and the 'right' notes sound wrong in numerous places, too. I'd absolutely love to see some of the haters make it to page two of the Cat Fugue!

    I like this performance a lot... I've never heard it played at this tempo before. It's almost like she's trying to play the cat, pace quavering at the racket.

  • @KlioDucatillon

    You're a hard act to follow! I just ADORE her !

    Scraggy2011

  • Thank you for posting this wonderful peace. Her playing soothes my ears.

  • im gonna get a harpsichord soon. my gret uncle made one and after they fix it im gonna get it.

  • You lucky schnook!

  • Whos the player what a wounderfull combo of harp,violin,bass chello and so on

  • Funny about all the critics. Never see any of their postings on You tube do you. To scared they might be criticised. I love the way they make idiots of themselves as if they know it all.

  • very nice attempt, never played it on the harpischord before, actually never played on the harpischord before. about, the trills, according to time era and compose, better to do the the other way, and with less pause

  • I don't hear anything wrong with the trills. What do you mean by the other way and with less pause? It is quite baroque what she does. I don't like the alterations in the different keyboards she is using, but the piece is wonderfully played.

  • SKILLZ

  • She fucked up about eight times. Even still, i'm incredibly jealous of her baroque-playing skills.

  • well, that is what you get whilst playing the harpsichord. It is much less fault-tolerant compared to the piano. One simply cannot hide any mistake on this instrument (I am a "harpsichordist" myself) and your timing has to be extremely punctual because of the character of the instrument! I agree with you, she plays beautifully.

  • she does indeed

  • I love the colors of the keys on the harpsichord. The naturals are black and the accidentals are white. It's cool!

  • Elaine,

    You probably do not want to remember the mistakes that were made in this performance, but hearing them makes me remember that the music was composed by a human, and played by one as well. Your music was no more feline than if a cat had played that fugue itself.

    Maxwell Garrison, 14

  • At the very end of the piece - what is that, an embellishment, an ornament? What do you call this, E? It sounds fantastic! By the way, have you posted that Bach Prelude in C from WTC 1? I think the world needs to hear how very beautiful that is. Bless you!

  • that is what harpsichordist call a phrased chord (I think that translates it best to english). It is quite common to phrase chords like this in harpsichord playing.

  • Thanks for the response. And thanks for taking on some of the boors and philistines here who write nonsense about this beautiful playing. True art these days has too few defenders. (:-D)

  • amen

  • (:-D)

  • Then you are like those true art attackers.

    To you the only difference is that you know your right. Right?

    True, todays music is degenerated, popularized.

    You're just lazy to listen if you claim that true art music stopped 100 years ago.

    And Scarlatti is true musics? :D

  • Elaine, I could not ring in my bday without stopping by to hear the lady with the Hubbard! ^_^ You know, Anton Rubinstein had played this piece on one of his Historical Recitals. I had never heard this piece before - so yours has been the honor of premiering it for me. It's a rare treat, because you do play with feeling, depth, and finesse. Thanks for adding to this day in your own inimitable way! (:-D)

  • The name "The Cat's Fugue" is because Scarlatti heard his cat named Pucinela walking in his harpsichord and composed this fugue based in the sounds produced by the cat walking in the intrument.

    source: "100 Cats Who Changed Civilization: History's Most Influential Felines" by Sam Stall pp.141-143

  • Very good words. very amazing.

  • This is how they played during the baroque. Standing up.

  • What's the thing about the name? "The Cat's fugue"?

  • I'm guessing the main theme is supposed to imatate the way a cat walks up a piano! My cat always does this and wakes me up all the time!

  • My cat does the same thing but he doesn't play half as nicely as this lady does. Like I tell him; practice, practice, practice...

  • lol

  • Grandiosa!!!!!!

    Bravo

    Cesar Amaro

  • This is not even a piano love...it's a harpsicord, way diffrent, plucking strings rather then hammering strings to make the sound.

  • Those are not stumbles nor turns, those are simply a trill on the note =) (At least my score says so)

  • Very nice! Do you tune the d sharps up to e flats? It sounds like it! I like the tuning a lot.

  • Yeah there are a few "interesting" added notes but I think she did a pretty good job. I liked some of her articulation. I wonder if she would have done better sitting. Scarlatti wrote 5 fugues. This is his earliest and most popular. The one in d minor Kp.417 (correct me if I am wrong) is the only other one that is really played. I cannot find it on the site. A pity no one plays the others.

  • J'aime son style.

    Elle fait sonner le clavecin comme je l'aime!

    Dommage qu'elle accorche des touches...

  • never seen a form of playing...whilst stanging! Oo! lol

  • I've read that she prefers standing while playing. It's just her preference, heh.

  • I don't think they are stumbles. They sound more like misarticulated turns. I don't have the score in front of me. I'll have to pull it, and double check.

  • i think i like the piano better

  • It sounds really mysterious but also mesmerizing

  • did she stumble at 1:28?

    I've never heard this before, so i wasn't sure

  • good ear! and I think she stumbled in a few other moments, which is highly unacceptable! it destroys the whole piece! or maybe Scarlatti deliberately would use dissonant chords:), long before Schoenberg's dodecaphonistic revolution!

  • it prob was after watching a few of the videos playing i think there are a few msitakes but as many harpsichord pieces are relatively high speed its understandable.. but then again maybe we're wrong and it wasnt xD

  • I think the music speaks for itself here on the harpsichord, it is its own personna, really.

    BUT...wouldn't you get a tad tired standing?

  • it's one of my grade 8 piano pieces so yeah i agree with you

  • She looks as if she came to the harpsichord late in life...her technique to me looks more pianistic. I would appreciate a more detached articulation, especially in her presentation of the subject; I find it makes the voices clearer than in this more legato interpretation. And I myself prefer more ornamentation, but one can't fault her for differences in opinion.

  • meh

  • her technique is exemplary, i don't know what the fuck you're talking about. All good pianists would adapt their technique depending on the period of the particular piece. My technique for bach is different to that for Chopin. I don't even know what a 'pianistic' would be? Almost everybody comes to harsichord late in life.

  • No, don't get me wrong. I don't mean that she is somehow worse because she was a late-comer. I just think that her technique is closer to that used for piano than what is typically employed for harpsichord. And certainly we play different for different eras, composers, genres, etc. Like I said, I have differences of opinion from her interpretation, but I don't think she's a poor musician at all.

  • Must agree with Yanreurriek here and tell you that you Raffzeee don't know what the #$% you are talking about. Her technique is pianistic. If you are arguing period technique for this particular piece, it all wrong. Scarlatti would not have played it this way or played this style of instrument. The instrument - Flemish - would not have been played by Scarlatti. He would have played a bright double-strung brass Italian in Italian Cypress. Sorry dude, you're wrong.

  • lol, it's funny how she kind of looks like a crazy cat lady...

  • Playing standing up...?Unusual

  • Chairs that big would be unusual.

  • Unusual, but better than sitting down! You are more alert standing and can also apply more weight to an instrument if necessary. Some businessmen are aware of the first fact and use "standing desks".

  • although, the "volume" of a harpsichord doesn't change by pressing the key harder or putting more weight into it.

    True, you are more alert though.

  • sounds like the mid ground between piano and guitar. I love it.

  • it was called the "mechanized lute" informally for a long time.

  • beautiful.

  • The "cat" in the name " cat's fugue" has an explanation or is it just an abstract name? I mean, why Cat?

  • The story goes that Scarlatti's cat walked up the keyboard and produced the first six notes of the subject, which the downward scale resolves into a cadence; the haphazard set of ascending notes produce very interesting counterpoint, especially when they appear in the bass.

  • Absolutely fascinating

  • very interesthing

  • @timribchester Yes. That.

  • It is supposed to depict a cat's stealth and stalking abilities.

  • well, yeah, ok...but playing a fugue with two manual in this case, its to easy having the theme right in front ... cannot do this in bach fugue, and there the fun with the theme starts ;)

  • What a superb musician! Yes, it is strange to see a harpsichordist playing standing up, but this is her preference, obviously, and she plays gorgeously. The lead singer of the Stone Temple Pilots sings seated, and Balzac and Hemingway both wrote standing at their writing desks.

    It is sad to read so many of the comments, here and elsewhere: grammar, spelling and syntax are atrociously, pathetically, ridiculously, and hopelessly bad...

  • The harpsichord is elevated...look at the stand.

  • LOL!~

  • Great; now this excellent musician has to have your filthy, juvenille language underneath her video. You are an idiot.

  • That playing makes me really envious!!  Nice Nice!!

  • Wow. Who is this lady?

  • I believe many early keyboard instruments were played standing.

  • I don't know why she is standing. I have never seen anyone stand to play the harpsichord!  Obviously, this is her instrument, customized as it is.

  • Dhuuuu shes standing because its high.

  • I like this performance. Can you tell me why the player stands at the noble harpsichord instead of sitting?

  • I would hate to haveto tune a harpsicord i mean it has so many strings!

  • then correct yourself and drop it!

  • you know, there's always gotta be some jerk to start up stuff on youtube. Everybody has to be a critic!

  • Well, my gosh, I wouldn't know what to do without your help. Why don't you just leave it alone?

  • you really sjould watch your lauguage i agree stop spreading your filth...

  • I know that, I was just mentioning that Bach was a genius at this instrument.

  • what a fascinating instrument! Bach was a genius! I would love to have that standing in my home.

  • At a period in musical history, instruments like the harpsichord were made to be played standing up. This harpsichord is made to be played standing up.

  • ...and it really helps with the vacuum cleaning lol

  • she has to stand up to reach the keys, she must be tiny

  • HAHA!!!

  • i m learning this song on piano now and it sounds totally different! the harpsichord vers is so much nicer.

  • The cats loves to walking over the keyboards of piano or others so....Can they have a sense of music???^v^

  • Nice harpsichord, but the legs look like they came out a bit big.