Composition
Czerny composed a very large number of pieces (more than a thousand pieces and up to Op. 861). According to Anton Kuerti possibly the biggest musical production in the history of music.
Czerny himself divided his music into four categories:
- 1) studies and exercises;
- 2) easy pieces for students;
- 3) brilliant pieces for concerts;
- 4) serious music.
Czerny´s works include not only piano music (études, nocturnes, sonatas, opera theme arrangements and variations) but also masses and choral music, symphonies, concertos, songs, string quartets and other chamber music. The better known part of Czerny's repertoire is the large number of didactic piano pieces he wrote, such as The School of Velocity and The Art of Finger Dexterity. He was one of the first composers to use étude ("study") for a title. Czerny's body of works also include arrangements of many popular opera themes.
The majority of the pieces called by Czerny as "serious music" (masses, choral music, quartets, orchestral and chamber music) remained unpublished. The manuscripts are held by Vienna's Society for the Friends of Music, to which Czerny (a childless bachelor) willed his estate.
Read more about this topic: Ballets By Carl Czerny
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