Show Notes
In this new episode, we return to a concept that is constantly invoked in 19th-century music — and just as constantly misunderstood today: tempo rubato. The word itself suggests freedom, flexibility, even licence. But when we look closely at historical sources, a very different picture emerges. Together, we ask a simple but uncomfortable question: what if much of what we now call rubato is not expressive freedom at all, but a way of compensating for tempos that were set too fast to begin with? Our point of departure is a striking passage by William Mason, who describes hearing Chopin played with such exaggerated rubato that entire measures were effectively added to the music — a practice that audiences praised, but that Mason dismissed as being “mathematically out of time.” For Mason, true rubato was not about slowing everything down, but about losing and regaining time within a stable temporal framework. From there, we trace two fundamentally different meanings of tempo rubato: * the older practice, rooted in bel canto and common throughout the 18th and early 19th centuries, in which the accompaniment remains strictly in time while the melody breathes freely; * and the later, modern notion of rubato, where the basic tempo itself expands and contracts, often without compensation. We place these ideas in a broader historical context, drawing on Czerny, Schindler, Schumann, and — crucially — Chopin’s own pupils, whose testimonies leave little doubt about how rubato was understood and practiced in his circle. Again and again, the same principle returns: the left hand is the clock. What emerges is not a romantic myth of unrestricted freedom, but a demanding discipline — one that only works when the underlying tempo is solid, playable, and proportionate. In that light, rubato stops being an excuse, and becomes something far more precise and powerful. This episode is part of our ongoing attempt to reconnect tempo, technique, and expression — and to show that many of the “solutions” of modern performance practice may in fact be symptoms of a deeper misunderstanding. If you’d like to support the podcast and go deeper into these discussions, you can subscribe to Authentic Sound on Substack. For €5/month, subscribers get access to the video version of the podcast.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit wimwinters.substack.com/subscribe
More from Authentic Sound Podcast
In Part II of our journey through Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, Alberto Sanna and I move from the quiet flow of the brook to birdsong, village dancing, the terrifying storm, and finally the return of calm. Along the way, we explore why some of the apparently simplest passages were among the hardest for us to perform, how articulation and rhythmic weight make Beethoven’s unusually spacious tempi come alive, and how Czerny transforms orchestral colour into something astonishing on the fortepiano. The famous bird calls and storm also bring us straight back to the central question behind this entire project: what happens when we take Beethoven’s metronome marks seriously? Far from making the music static, the whole-beat approach reveals layers of rhythm, colour, timing and physical energy that are easily lost at modern speeds. A listening guide to movements II–V of Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony—and to one of the most extraordinary storms ever written in music.
Maurice Ravel’s Pavane pour une infante défunte presents a fascinating tempo puzzle. The first piano edition gives a metronome mark of ♩ = 80. Yet Ravel was reportedly known for playing the piece extraordinarily slowly. About a decade later, his orchestral version appeared with a very different indication: ♩ = 54. Why did Ravel change the tempo so dramatically? In this episode, we compare the scores, historical accounts, Ravel’s own piano-roll recording, and performances by later pianists. The result leads us into a much broader question: could Ravel’s Pavane preserve evidence of the transition from whole-beat to single-beat metronome practice around the turn of the twentieth century? It is a small musical mystery with potentially much larger consequences for how we understand historical tempo.
Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony seems to go almost nowhere—and that is precisely its radical power. In this first part of our whole-beat listening guide to the “Pastoral” Symphony, Alberto Sanna and I explore its opening movement. We examine how Beethoven replaces dramatic conflict with repetition, atmosphere, and the unchanging cycles of nature; why Czerny’s four-hand transcription is exceptionally difficult despite its apparent simplicity; and how whole-beat tempi restore the music’s timing, orchestral colours, polyrhythms, and sense of suspended time. Along the way, we discuss the symphony’s historical context, its place in Beethoven’s famous 1808 concert, the difference between modern and nineteenth-century listening, and the evidence that continues to challenge the conventional single-beat interpretation of Beethoven’s metronome marks. Want to listen to ‘our’ Beethoven symphonies 3 times for free? Go to Bandcamp Or buy the 10 CD box on our website.
The discount code revealed at the end of this podcast can be redeemed here: https://www.authenticsound.org/recordings Pablo Casals knew Brahms personally. Decades later, in a recorded masterclass, he made a striking claim: Brahms did not count the quarter notes in his Allegro vivace, but the eighth notes—and that is why his music is “nearly always” played too fast. In this episode, Wim and Stefan unpack the far-reaching implications of that remark. What determines whether music feels like an Andante, an Allegretto, or an Allegro molto? Can exactly the same physical tempo produce a completely different sense of movement, depending on which note value the performer or listener follows? The discussion then turns to Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 16, Op. 31 No. 1, and Czerny’s seemingly contradictory instruction that its Allegretto finale must be played as an Allegro molto. Far from being a contradiction, it may reveal something fundamental about nineteenth-century notation, subdivision, and tempo perception. Casals’ brief demonstration takes us directly to the heart of whole-beat metronome practice: historical tempo was not simply a matter of speed, but of understanding which layer of the music carried the movement. The episode concludes with Alberto Sanna performing the Rondo from Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 16 in G major, Op. 31 No. 1.
When was the last time Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony knocked on your door? 00:23:11 — I. Allegro con brio01:11:48 — II. Andante con moto01:41:16 — III. Scherzo. Allegro01:58:39 — IV. Allegro Everyone knows those four notes. They may be the most famous opening in all of music. But familiarity can also become a problem: once a piece has become an icon, we often stop truly listening. In this episode, Wim Winters and Alberto Sanna return to Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony with new ears. Using their recording of Czerny’s four-hand transcription as a point of departure, they explore how tempo, notation, articulation, silence, long notes, and the sound world of the fortepiano radically reshape the listening experience. This is not simply a discussion about speed. It is about character. The famous opening motive is not treated as a rushed gesture, but as something weighty, solemn, physical, and deeply human. The long silences begin to speak. The rests become part of the drama. The Andante reveals an almost heartbreaking tenderness. The Scherzo and Finale unfold not as a race toward triumph, but as a vast architectural journey from darkness into light. Along the way, Wim and Alberto discuss the 1808 Akademie concert, the shock of their whole-beat approach, the role of Czerny’s transcription, the unique response of their Viennese fortepiano, and the many places where Beethoven’s score begins to make new sense when given more time to breathe. For listeners who think they already know Beethoven’s Fifth, this episode asks a simple question: What if the most familiar symphony ever written still has something completely new to say?