Word: ponticello
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...other choirs treated independently. Even the quartet itself was overly consistent in its color: passionate lines in the upper register nearly dominated the work. Clearly this was necessary in order to isolate the quartet from the orchestral strings. Yet the contrasting colors of pizzicato, double stops, trills, tremolos, sul ponticello or sul tasto bowings, if present, were far too subtle to stand...
...quite lighthearted compared to the general severity of the piece. Throughout the Quintet composer Sessions demonstrated a fantastic command of string emsemble sounds and effects: the use of block chords in the four upper strings underlined by 'cello pizzicato, as well as the fleeting recurrences of muted ponticello, were particularly notable...
...Smith, who played General Kutuzov with sinewy dignity. High point of the opera came in one of the closing scenes, in which Andrey and Natasha were reunited as Andrey lay on his deathbed. Through his delirium he hears a pulsing beat, played in the orchestra by the strings sul ponticello (bow strokes near the bridge), and echoes it over and over again in a faint, falling cry. In one of Prokofiev's most dramatic musical inventions, the orchestra announces Andrey's approaching death-a scene that ranks among the greatest ever written for opera...
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