A unique position in pianoforte literature is occupied by these
Preludes, Op. 28. They derive their name rather from their form than
from their musical import. Like the usual preludes to songs, or more
extended musical works, they are short, fragmentary tone sketches rather
than complete pictures; each consisting, as a rule, of a single, simple
movement, and embodying but a single concrete idea, and seeming to imply
by its brevity and its suggestive rather than fully descriptive
character, that a more elaborately developed composition is to follow,
to which this has been but an introduction and in which the idea, here
merely outlined, will receive more exhaustive treatment. In reality,
however, each of these preludes is complete in itself; an exquisite
musical vignette containing, like some dainty vial of hand-cut Venetian
glass, the distilled essence of dead flowers of memory and experience
from Chopin’s past; particularly of scenes, episodes, and emotional
impressions of his romantic life on the island of Majorca. Just as a
painter might have sketched, with hasty but truthfully graphic pencil,
on the pages of his portfolio, the fleeting impressions produced upon
his senses and imagination by this novel, picturesque environment, so
the composer has preserved in these bits of offhand but vivid tone
painting, glimpses into his daily life, his moods and experiences during
that winter of 1838-39.
Banished by his physicians to this Mediterranean isle, in the hope of
benefit to his fast failing health, and refused shelter in any hotel or
private residence, on account of the there prevalent belief that
consumption was contagious, Chopin and the little party of devoted
friends who accompanied him (most notable among whom was the famous
French novelist, George Sand) were forced to improvise a temporary abode
in the semi-habitable wing of an old ruined convent, which had been
abandoned by the monks. It was picturesquely situated on a rocky
promontory, commanding a view, on the one side, of the open sea, dotted
with the countless white sails of Mediterranean commerce; on the other,
of the sheltered bay, the village beyond, and the lofty volcanic
mountains in the background. Here they spent the winter, and here nearly
all of the preludes, with many others of Chopin’s most poetic smaller
works, originated—artistic crystallizations of passing impressions and
experiences, concerning which and the life in which they originated,
George Sand writes: “While staying here he composed some short but very
beautiful pieces which he modestly entitled preludes. They were real
masterpieces. Some of them create such vivid impressions that the shades
of the dead monks seem to rise and pass before the hearer in solemn and
gloomy funeral pomp. Others are full of charm and melancholy, glowing
with the sparkling fire of enthusiasm, breathing with the hope of
restored health. The laughter of the children at play, the distant
strains of the guitar, the twitter of birds on the damp branches, would
call forth from his soul melodies of indescribable sweetness and grace.
But many also are so full of gloom and sadness that, in spite of the
pleasure they afford, the listener is filled with pain. Some of his
later tone-poems bring before us a sparkling crystal stream reflecting
the sunbeams. Chopin’s quieter compositions remind us of the song of the
lark as it lightly soars into the ether, or the gentle gliding of the
swan over the smooth mirror of the waters; they seem filled with the
holy calm of nature. When Chopin was in a despondent mood, the piercing
cry of the hungry eagle among the crags of Majorca, the mournful wailing
of the storm, and the stern immovability of the snow-clad heights, would
awaken gloomy fancies in his soul. Then again, the perfume of the orange
blossoms, the vine bending to the earth beneath its rich burden, the
peasant singing his Moorish songs in the fields, would fill him with
delight.”
The Prelude in D flat, No. 15, which I select as one of the most
beautiful and characteristic of these sketches, embodies a strange day
dream of the composer in which, as he says, “vision and reality were
indistinguishably blended.”
One bright, late autumn morning the little party of friends had taken
advantage of the weather, and of the fact that Chopin seemed in
unusually good health and spirits, to make a long-talked-of excursion to
the neighboring village, promising to return before sunset. During their
absence a sudden tropical tempest of terrific severity swept the island.
The wind blew a hurricane, the rain descended in floods, the streams
rose, bridges and roadways were destroyed, and it was only with extreme
difficulty and considerable danger that they succeeded in reaching the
convent about midnight, having spent six hours in traversing the last
mile and a half of the distance. They found Chopin in a state bordering
on delirium. The physical effect of the storm on his shattered nerves,
combined with his own depression and his keen anxiety for them, had
combined to work his sensitive, and at that time morbid, temperament up
to a state of feverish excitement, in which the normal barriers between
perception and hallucination had well-nigh vanished. He told them
afterward that he had been a prey to a gruesome vision of which this
prelude is the musical portrayal.
He fancied that he lay dead at the bottom of the sea; that near him sat
a beautiful siren singing in exquisitely sweet and tender strains, a
song of his own life and love and sorrow. But though her voice was
soothing in its dreamy pathos, and though he felt oppressed by a
crushing languor and fatigue and longed for rest, he could not lose
consciousness, because tormented by the regular, relentlessly monotonous
fall of great drops upon his heart. As the drops continued increasing
steadily in weight and in importunate demand upon his attention, as if
burdened with some great and sad significance which he must recognize,
he became aware that they were the tears of his friends on earth whom he
had loved and lost. With this knowledge, vivid memory and poignant pain
awoke together, and his anguish grew to an overpowering climax of
intensity. Then, nature’s limit being reached, the force of his tempest
of grief finally exhausted itself, and he sank gradually into a state of
dull, despairing lethargy, and at last into welcome unconsciousness, the
last sound in his ears being the soothing strains of the siren, and his
last sensation the now faint and feeble, but still regular falling of
his friends’ tears upon his heart.
This composition should be conceived and executed so as to render, to
the full, its intensely emotional character. The first theme in D flat
major, with its sweetly languorous tone, should be given quite slowly,
with pressure touch, producing a penetrating, but not loud, singing
quality of tone, while the reiterated A flat in the accompaniment,
which, throughout the whole work suggests the falling drops, must be at
first vaguely hinted rather than distinctly struck. The middle part in
chords should be commenced very softly with a whispering, mysterious
tone, affecting the hearer like the first shadow of an approaching
thunder cloud, or the presentiment of coming woe. Then the power should
steadily increase—gradually, relentlessly, like the stealthy,
irresistible rising of the dark cold tide about some chained victim in
an ocean cave, where the light of day has never penetrated; mounting
steadily—not rapidly—to the overwhelming climax of the reiterated
octave B in the right hand.
In the repetition of this passage the same effect should be produced,
with the climax still more intensified. Then let the power as gradually
decrease, till at the return of the siren’s song it has sunk into
pianissimo and the closing measure should fade away into silence, like
the echo of dream bells.
I have dwelt at some length upon this prelude because it is the best
known of the set; the most complete and, generally speaking, the most
effective; and because, in connection with the suggestive quotation from
George Sand, it will serve as a helpful illustration to the student in
arriving at an intelligent comprehension of the others. But a few words
in further elucidation of some of them may be in place.
The first, in somber, sonorous chords, expresses Chopin’s initial
impressions of the stately, but half-ruined monastery in which he and
his little party had found refuge, and the solemn thoughts called up by
its decaying grandeur, its silent loneliness, its vast, gloomy,
memory-haunted halls and cloisters.
The third represents an evening scene, with the setting sun kindling to
crimson and gold the spires and picturesque whitewashed cottages of the
village of Majorca, a mile away across the little bay, while the gentle
breeze, like the sigh of departing day, brings the sound of silvery
bells from the little village church ringing the vesper chimes.
The fifth and sixth embody the same mood, in an almost identically
similar setting. They may be effectively combined into one picture of a
dark, depressing, late autumnal day; a day of gray skies and leaden sea;
of heavy, windless calm, the calm of exhaustion and utter weariness,
with the low, sad rain dripping monotonously upon the roof like the
tears of the gods for a dying world. In one, the melody expressing the
element of human sorrow is in the soprano, plaintively, touchingly,
sweetly pathetic. In the other, it is placed in the lower register of
Chopin’s favorite orchestral instrument, the ’cello, which it
reproduces, throbbing with a more passionate intensity, a more poignant
pain. But in general character and treatment the two belong together.
No. 8 tells of the gay carol of the birds at dawn, floating in at the
open windows of Chopin’s chamber. No. 17 is a rustic dance of the
Majorcan peasants. No. 24, the last, is a graphic description of a
tropical storm with the flash of lightning and the ominous roll of the
thunder literally portrayed.
Space does not permit of a detailed analysis of all the numbers, but
each has its special character and suggestive import, and is a picture
of some episode or mood during that winter’s sojourn on Majorca.