Studies of early 20th-century performance practice tend to focus on features that are alien to late 20th- and early 21st-century ears. Empirical analysis of timing in recordings of Chopin's Etude, Op. 25 no. 1—a piece for which performance style has remained relatively static—suggests how some foundational rules of phrasing and expressive nuance have changed over the history of recorded music. Melody note onsets were marked manually in 127 commercial recordings dating from 1909 to 2016. Overall, the data do not show an increase or decrease over time in the amount of tempo fluctuation. Independently of a tendency to use slower tempi, pianists changed the way they employ rubato. Several factors contribute to a trend whereby the fourth beat is lengthened at the expense of the second and third beats: an increase in phrase-final lengthening, an increase in the use of tempo arching for shorter groups of measures, and a tendency to delay the arrival of an accented dissonance or change of harmony instead of lengthening the melody inter-onset interval that contains it. The data illustrate nearly imperceptible shifts in interpretation and suggest that some practices thought to be the bedrock of expressive performance may be historically conditioned.

中文翻译：

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表现性时机策略的历史趋势：肖邦的练习曲，作品。25 号 1

对 20 世纪早期表演实践的研究倾向于关注与 20 世纪末和 21 世纪初的耳朵格格不入的特征。肖邦练习曲 Op. 录音中时间的实证分析 25 号 1——演奏风格保持相对静止的乐曲——表明了一些基本的乐句和表达细微差别规则在录制音乐的历史中发生了怎样的变化。从 1909 年到 2016 年，在 127 个商业录音中手动标记了旋律音符的开始。总体而言，数据并未显示节奏波动量随时间的增加或减少。独立于使用较慢速度的趋势，钢琴家改变了他们使用 rubato 的方式。有几个因素导致了第四拍以第二和第三拍为代价延长的趋势：乐句结尾延长的增加，在较短的小节组中增加使用节奏拱形，并且倾向于延迟重音不和谐或和声变化的到来，而不是延长包含它的旋律间隔。这些数据说明了解释中几乎难以察觉的变化，并表明一些被认为是表现表现基石的实践可能受到历史的制约。