Description:
DAVID BREITMAN is an associate professor of historical performance at Oberlin Conservatory. He is also an accomplished performer.
Acknowledgments:
Without Malcolm Bilson’s tireless, decades-long campaign for the fortepiano, a book like this one would never have been written, let alone read. For thirty-fve years he has been an inspiration to me—as a teacher, performer, scholar, and friend: this work is for Malcolm, a small token of my gratitude. Directly after completing my DMA at Cornell, I began teaching at Oberlin, and Oberlin has been my productive academic home ever since. Tanks to Tom Kelly, Conrad Cummings, Jocelyn Swigger, Andrea McAlister, and Steven Plank for reading early versions of the manuscript; to Peter Takacs for our regular dissections of problems in Beethoven; and to countless others with whom I’ve had fruitful conversations over the years. But I’m grateful to my students above all, because, in the end, the book is about what I’ve learned from them. Some, notably Max Fleischman and Daniel Walden, will recognize their fngerprints on many of these pages; I can’t thank them enough. Tanks also to Oberlin College’s Grants ofce and to Pam Snyder personally for generous institutional support of this project—with a special shout-out to my student assistant Liam Kaplan for the elegantly typeset musical examples. Te book could not have been written without the assistance of my wife Kathryn Stuart, who has been by my side through this whole journey, and whose patience, encouragement, sage advice and careful proofreading have made it possible.
