I am working on a piece in which each of the notes of the motive (in quavers and semi-quavers) are topped with the tenuto mark and there is the written indication "(saltando)" (sic), which, in Italian means jumping and I cannot quite figure out what should be happening. As the piece is quite fast, there is not really that much time to move away from the keys on the semiquavers. I do have a recording of the piece in question and it seemed to me the pianist solved the issue by ignoring it. Does anyone have any idea which the composer could mean?
I listened today to my recording of the piece and I found out that the composer seems to call for portato, which is, as you know, a violin thing, something between legato and staccato. Being music based on a violin tune, that makes sense. In any case, that is just what I am doing, though the effect rather tends to disappear in the semi-quavers.
I have heard the word portato used by a pianist to refer to a non legato touch, in other words a similar meaning to the violin thing. As non legato is often played by bouncing the fingers off the keys, this is perhaps what he means by saltando.
Hi Richard, Here is some information from Elson's dictionary: Saltando -- For piano: leaping, proceeding by skips, or jumps. For violin music: it means skipping the bow upon the strings. As for portato, it has no connection to portamento. A lot of pianists believe they are the same. Not true. Portato is a touch halfway between legato and staccato. Most of us, I think, call it "nonlegato", especially in Baroque music. I was taught to play portato as pressing more into the keys while respecting the dynamic too. David
