The Five Most-Often Performed Piano Concertos at Carnegie Hall

[maestrob]

This webpage lists the five most often performed piano concertos at Carnegie Hall, with audio excerpts (complete movements) from historic recordings and information about each famous work:



https://www.carnegiehall.org/explore/ar ... Code=36601

[Rach3]

Thanks, interesting. Beethoven 4 bit of a surprise ?

[diegobueno]

All five concertos are among the Usual Suspects of the concerto literature. I'm kind of surprised that no Mozart or Rachmaninoff made the list, but with only 5 slots, something was going to be left out.

I was thinking, what if we restricted the list to the most frequently performed piano concertos written within the past 100 years? 1921 to the present: which piano concertos are the most frequently performed? Not necessarily the best compositions, but the most frequently performed. I compiled a list, and it turns out that a large number of the candidates were written in the 1920s, and so have only a few more years to be considered for this category. Indeed, the earliest on the list, Prokofiev's 3rd, was completed in 1921 and so has only a couple more months of eligibility.

My guess, not necessarily in order of most frequent, is that these 5 are the most frequently performed from 1921-2021 (if anyone here has actual statistics, feel free to refute me):

Gershwin – Rhapsody in Blue
Gershwin – Concerto in F
Rachmaninoff – Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini
Ravel – Concerto in G major
Prokofiev – Concerto no. 3

Other contenders might be these:

Shostakovich – Concerto no. 1
Shostakovich – Concerto no. 2

Bartok – Concerto no. 1
Bartok – Concerto no. 2
Bartok – Concerto no. 3
Poulenc – Concerto for 2 pianos
Rachmaninoff – Concerto no. 4
Possibly the Khachaturian was a contender at one time

As much as I love the Stravinsky and Schoenberg concerti, I don't think they're anywhere near contenders for most performed. I can think of many other worthies, by composers such as Lutoslawski, Ligeti, Adams, Barber, Rautavaara, on and on, and hope they may some day catch on enough to make a future "most performed" list.

[barney]

I was a little surprised by the presence of Liszt 1. For the most part, the list reflects 20th century tastes. For example, I suspect the Tchaikovsky is less played now than the mid-20th century, while Rachmaninov 2 and 3 have greatly increased in number of performances.

Mozart probably suffers from having too many concertos. Nos 9, 20 and 27 in particular would be contenders, I would have thought.

[Rach3]

I was a little surprised by the presence of Liszt 1. For the most part, the list reflects 20th century tastes. For example, I suspect the Tchaikovsky is less played now than the mid-20th century, while Rachmaninov 2 and 3 have greatly increased in number of performances.

Mozart probably suffers from having too many concertos. Nos 9, 20 and 27 in particular would be contenders, I would have thought.

Indeed.As I was surprised at Beethoven 4th included.Also, no Mozart 21 ?

[Wallingford]

No Brahms?

BOO! HISS!

[maestrob]

No Brahms?

BOO! HISS!

Quite right.

[barney]

However, Carnegie's top 5 symphonies includes Brahms 1, 2 and 4. 3 out of 5! Not bad when he only wrote 4. the other two are Beethoven.

[diegobueno]

Beethoven startles the audience with the opening notes of his concerto—gone is the time-honored orchestral introduction paving the way for the soloist

The Carnegie Hall article quotes from the Universal Music Appreciation Factoid Textbook to serve up a standard half-truth. The piano does enter at the beginning of the 4th and 5th concerti, but in both cases what follows is, in fact, the "time-honored orchestral introduction", delayed but not removed (as had been the case many years earlier in Mozart's Jeunehomme Concerto). I've read this so many times in program notes, it just annoys me to see it served up again.

I don't know who was the first to truly abandon the orchestral exposition in a piano concerto, but it was already a thing by the time Mendelssohn and Schumann got around to writing theirs.

[Rach3]

I don't know who was the first to truly abandon the orchestral exposition in a piano concerto, but it was already a thing by the time Mendelssohn and Schumann got around to writing theirs.

Perhaps Stephen Hiller ? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUJmspDS4_c
I could not quickly find a Czerny,Hummel,Field,Weber that abandoned.

In any event, I agree with you,always amuses me the emphasis on Beethoven 4th given what Mozart did in "Jeunehomme" . Which audience was "startled" ? As I recall, the reporting is that at the premiere of the Beethoven 4th in Vienna the audience was freezing rather than startled.

[maestrob]

I don't know who was the first to truly abandon the orchestral exposition in a piano concerto, but it was already a thing by the time Mendelssohn and Schumann got around to writing theirs.

Perhaps Stephen Hiller ? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUJmspDS4_c
I could not quickly find a Czerny,Hummel,Field,Weber that abandoned.

In any event, I agree with you,always amuses me the emphasis on Beethoven 4th given what Mozart did in "Jeunehomme" . Which audience was "startled" ? As I recall, the reporting is that at the premiere of the Beethoven 4th in Vienna the audience was freezing rather than startled.

Lovely work and very well played! Thanks, Steve!

[diegobueno]

Perhaps Stephen Hiller ? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUJmspDS4_c
I could not quickly find a Czerny,Hummel,Field,Weber that abandoned.

Mendelssohn's 1st concerto (1831) is still the earliest example I know of.