Transition from Baroque to modern fingering

Much has been written on the Baroque fingering system (scales played mostly with 2 or 3 fingers by crossing them) and the modern fingering (scales played by thumb-passing). Much less on the transition between the two systems.

From the scarce (mostly French and German and a few Italian) Baroque sources it has been shown that up to the early 1730’s the Baroque fingering was in full use.
Fingerings and music from the late 1740s onwards show the modern fingering in use (although the Baroque fingering was kept as an alternative for quite a few years).

From the above one can “extrapolate” that during the “transition decade” from mid-1730s to mid-1740s, in French and German lands (the centre for keyboard playing at the time) they were “transitioning” in some way. What about sources and details?
When in 1741 masterpieces such as Rameau’s Concerts, Bach’s Goldberg Variations and CPE Bach’s first Württembergischen Sonaten saw the light (all works perfectly compatible with both Baroque and modern fingering), which was the prevalent technique employed by players at the time?

It would be useful to have more detail from the sources. Unfortunately, through the many publications of scholars who have delved deeper into the sources (mainly Lindley and Boxall) and have published dozens of extant fingerings from the 16h, 17th and 18th centuries, I have been unable to find anything dating from mid-1730s to mid-1740s.

Suggestions are welcome!

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I cannot answer your question Claudio, but I can ask a question. One of the principal aspects of modern fingering is turning the thumb under, is that not so? The question is, when was that first written or printed? What source do we have? How did that ‘meme’ spread through Europe? Was it purely oral transmission? In which case we will never know.

It seems to me that the question that needs to be answered is:

“Which are the earliest pieces that are unplayable with the Baroque fingering?”

Faced with these, contemporary players would be forced to either adopt modern ifngering or conclude that the works were unplayable!

David

Reply to Andrew: The first fingerings with thumb-passing universally for scales are in Rameau 1728.
However, the first detailed descriptions of the thumb-under movement are dated decades later (Turk?).
It is believed (Lindley & Boxall) that initiall the thumb was just passed by a fast lateral hand movement aided by a small bending of the thumb, not the modern piano movement (which in itself has variants: I know two very different ones!).

I know of no source giving us any clue about how the thumb passing spread over Europe from c1730 to c.1745. By the time CPE Bach gave it for granted in 1753 it was in widespread use.
I know no earlier full advice, just fingerings by Rameau and Prelleur, with no detailed text description.

Reply to David: I have shown (including public performances) that ALL JSBach is playable with Baroque fingering.

The earliest pieces that really look unplayable and were obviously meant for modern thumb passing are, I believe, Pascal Royer 1747. However, some Sonatas composed by CPEBach a few years earlier are good candidates as well.

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Let us also note that appearance of scores are deceptive, especially for us more familiar with modern techniques.

For example, looking at WF Bach Klavierfantasien, dated from c.1740 to c.1780, with no fingerings, many passages “clearly appear” meant for modern fingering. Yet we know from Türk that WF Bach kept using pairwise fingerings for scales up to the 1780s.

As for CPE Bach, his earliest fingerings known to me (I have not his complete works) are in the Sonatas from the Versuch, 1753. Modern thumb passing matter-of-fact of course.

… which is why, with so many certainties and many more uncertainties, it is safe to prescribe traditional fingering up to the first years of the 1730s and modern fingering from the last years of the 1740s onwards, but this leaves more than a decade of uncertainty.

This is why I started this exchhange specifically looking for ANY fingering dated c.1735-1745. None is known to me.

I stand corrected: Royer’s publication is dated 1746.

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Thinking ourselves back into the 18th century, I wonder how many players had access to printed (or copied) music, which is what we mainly base our research on. And if they did have access, how many of them actually sat down and learned the pieces? And who forned the audience of such players?

It is thought by some that many works were written purely as examples for others to learn how to improvise in the same style. Of course, improvising in the style of the WTC is only for rare musicians with the skills of JSB, and when he improvised for Fredk the Gt, his ricercar was in three voices, not four.

How many solo harpsichord recitals were there in the mid 17C? Of course, organists had the opportunity to “recite” in public during services, as they do today, but harpsichord players. What did players like Sweelionck actually play in public – we dont know.

I have moved away from a consideration of fingering, but merely to illustrate our ignorance of less arcane matters.

David

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What exactly do we mean by “unplayable”? If we just look at no thumb-passing, every scale at any speed level is playable without thumb-passing. Same for other fingering devices as, for example, the finger slipping from a sharp to the adjacent natural. I’d say even Rachmaninov should be “playable” with baroque fingering.
I believe thumb-passing was invented to get scales with no recognizable articulation pattern, isn’t it?

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Back to my 1735-1745 quest.

Found a recent work on historical fingering: 2014-Duvall’s Thesis on historical keyboard fingerings.

With interesting insights into some details in the sources, unfortunately Duvall’s work:

  • Is seen from the perspective of the modern pianist, looking at early fingerings as “primitive”.
  • So much so that some of his examples of early music passages are shown in modern editions with added crescendo, diminuendo and other spurious markings.
  • There is significant reliability on Forkel (his unreliability has been agreed upon ever since Spitta 1888)
  • No sources unknown to me are used: not helpful for my quest.
  • For a 208pp work, the bibliography is very short: only 26 authors mentioned: they do NOT include any of the modern musicians that have published important articles on traditional-fingering, such as Mark Lindley, Maria Boxall, Ton Koopman and others. This for me largely invalidates his analysis.

Pity.

Just googled “keyboard fingering 1735” up to 1745. Got only one interesting hit:

The Musical Times, 1890. “German … Daniel Speer 1697 … thumb of the left hand … no indication of … thumb of the right hand … such marking … found in Maies 1741 Musicsaal. Both in this work and in Mattheson’s “Kleine generalbasschule” … 1735, we find the fingering … on the old plan prescribed … by Speer … In 1744 … London … either hand 1,2,3,4”. (Not a significant information: Prelleur also in London had already done that back in 1731.)

Just to verity, I have just gone through a scan of Mattheson’s 290 page long treatise, and have failed to find any fingered musical passage there. (Perhaps the allusion is in the text?)
What I find surprising is that Lindley in his Fingering entry for Grove mentions Mattheson 1735, but for a remark on articulation, not on fingering. If there was a fingering there, it is surprising that Lindley did not mention it.

Conclusion: apparently we have Mattheson with Baroque fingerings in 1735.
Not surprising, and not of much help either.

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Reply to David re public recitals. Even organ recitals were a rarity: JSBach played for audiences before-during-after the religious services. Other than that, AFAIK the earliest solo-harpsichord playing for general audiences appears to have been not in solo keyboard but in concertato works: JSBach playing harpsichord concertos with strings accompaniment at Zimmermann’s, and Handel playing organ concertos with orchestra.

Other than the above, solo-keyboard playing for audiences surely had existed ever since the Renaissance, but were limited to noblemen’s palaces, for a restricted audience, not for general or ticket-paying public. In this respect, the first public keyboard recital is reported to have been by Johann Christian Bach on a fortepiano in London in 1768.

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Replying to Domenico’s remark:
AFAIK thumb-passing was meant initially (Rameau 1728) to make things easier when keyboard amateur playing grew as the first industrial revolution was approaching.
The change of technique had many effects, most importantly:

  • Making fingering-learning easier: just two thumb-passing movements instead of the many finger crossings.
  • Making it easier to play scales and difficult passages.
  • Relaxing the meticulous control of articulation produced by Baroque fingering, and required for proper performance in “inexpressive” keyboards such as the organ and the harpsichord.
  • Allowing instead better control of dynamics, required for the newcomers: clavichord and fortepiano.
  • Allowing better mastery of playing strongly to produce a ff in the fortepiano.
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I regard playing before or after the service as coming into the category of a recital. And then there are the opportunities to play during the service, when no singing is involved. Couperin’s masses are a good example of when the organist was (and is) free to “recite”.

Harpsichord players have no similar opportunities, even in opera.

David

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But beginning pianists have to work to avoid an accent on F in rising c-major scales.

David

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