VI. THE STUDIES:--TITANIC EXPERIMENTS
October 20, 1829, Frederic Chopin, aged twenty, wrote to his friend
Titus Woyciechowski, from Warsaw: "I have composed a study in my own
manner;" and November 14, the same year: "I have written some studies;
in your presence I would play them well."
Thus, quite simply and without booming of cannon or brazen proclamation
by bell, did the great Polish composer announce an event of supreme
interest and importance to the piano-playing world. Niecks thinks these
studies were published in the summer of 1833, July or August, and were
numbered op. 10. Another set of studies, op. 25, did not find a
publisher until 1837, although some of them were composed at the same
time as the previous work; a Polish musician who visited the French
capital in 1834 heard Chopin play the studies contained in op. 25. The
C minor study, op. 10, No. 12, commonly known as the Revolutionary, was
born at Stuttgart, September, 1831, "while under the excitement caused
by the news of the taking of Warsaw by the Russians, on September 8,
1831." These dates are given so as to rout effectually any dilatory
suspicion that Liszt influenced Chopin in the production of his
masterpieces. Lina Ramann, in her exhaustive biography of Franz Liszt,
openly declares that Nos. 9 and 12 of op. 10 and Nos. 11 and 12 of op.
25 reveal the influence of the Hungarian virtuoso. Figures prove the
fallacy of her assertion. The influence was the other way, as Liszt's
three concert studies show--not to mention other compositions. When
Chopin arrived in Paris his style had been formed, he was the creator
of a new piano technique.
The three studies known as Trois Nouvelles Etudes, which appeared in
1840 in Moscheles and Fetis Method of Methods were published separately
afterward. Their date of composition we do not know.
Many are the editions of Chopin's studies, but after going over the
ground, one finds only about a dozen worthy of study and consultation.
Karasowski gives the date of the first complete edition of the Chopin
works as 1846, with Gebethner & Wolff, Warsaw, as publishers. Then,
according to Niecks, followed Tellefsen, Klindworth--Bote &
Bock--Scholtz--Peters--Breitkopf & Hartel, Mikuli, Schuberth, Kahnt,
Steingraber--better known as Mertke's--and Schlesinger, edited by the
great pedagogue Theodor Kullak. Xaver Scharwenka has edited Klindworth
for the London edition of Augener & Co. Mikuli criticised the Tellefsen
edition, yet both men had been Chopin pupils. This is a significant
fact and shows that little reliance can be placed on the brave talk
about tradition. Yet Mikuli had the assistance of a half dozen of
Chopin's "favorite" pupils, and, in addition, Ferdinand Hiller. Herman
Scholtz, who edited the works for Peters, based his results on careful
inspection of original French, German and English editions, besides
consulting M. Georges Mathias, a pupil of Chopin. If Fontana, Wolff,
Gutmann, Mikuli and Tellefsen, who copied from the original Chopin
manuscripts under the supervision of the composer, cannot agree, then
upon what foundation are reared the structures of the modern critical
editions? The early French, German and Polish editions are faulty,
indeed useless, because of misprints and errata of all kinds. Every
succeeding edition has cleared away some of these errors, but only in
Karl Klindworth has Chopin found a worthy, though not faultless,
editor. His edition is a work of genius and was called by Von Bulow
"the only model edition." In a few sections others, such as Kullak, Dr.
Hugo Riemann and Hans von Bulow, may have outstripped him, but as a
whole his editing is amazing for its exactitude, scholarship, fertility
in novel fingerings and sympathetic insight in phrasing. This edition
appeared at Moscow from 1873 to 1876.
The twenty-seven studies of Chopin have been separately edited by
Riemann and Von Bulow.
Let us narrow our investigations and critical comparisons to
Klindworth, Von Bulow, Kullak and Riemann. Carl Reinecke's edition of
the studies in Breitkopf & Hartel's collection offers nothing new,
neither do Mertke, Scholtz and Mikuli. The latter one should keep at
hand because of the possible freedom from impurities in his text, but
of phrasing or fingering he contributes little. It must be remembered
that with the studies, while they completely exhibit the entire range
of Chopin's genius, the play's the thing after all. The poetry, the
passion of the Ballades and Scherzi wind throughout these technical
problems like a flaming skein. With the modern avidity for exterior as
well as interior analysis, Mikuli, Reinecke, Mertke and Scholtz
evidence little sympathy. It is then from the masterly editing of
Kullak, Von Bulow, Riemann and Klindworth that I shall draw copiously.
They have, in their various ways, given us a clue to their musical
individuality, as well as their precise scholarship. Klindworth is the
most genially intellectual, Von Bulow the most pedagogic, and Kullak is
poetic, while Riemann is scholarly; the latter gives more attention to
phrasing than to fingering. The Chopin studies are poems fit for
Parnassus, yet they also serve a very useful purpose in pedagogy. Both
aspects, the material and the spiritual, should be studied, and with
four such guides the student need not go astray.
In the first study of the first book, op. 10, dedicated to Liszt,
Chopin at a leap reached new land. Extended chords had been sparingly
used by Hummel and Clementi, but to take a dispersed harmony and
transform it into an epical study, to raise the chord of the tenth to
heroic stature--that could have been accomplished by Chopin only. And
this first study in C is heroic. Theodore Kullak writes of it: "Above a
ground bass proudly and boldly striding along, flow mighty waves of
sound. The etude--whose technical end is the rapid execution of widely
extended chord figurations exceeding the span of an octave--is to be
played on the basis of forte throughout. With sharply dissonant
harmonies the forte is to be increased to fortissimo, diminishing again
with consonant ones. Pithy accents! Their effect is enhanced when
combined with an elastic recoil of the hand."
The irregular, black, ascending and descending staircases of notes
strike the neophyte with terror. Like Piranesi's marvellous aerial
architectural dreams, these dizzy acclivities and descents of Chopin
exercise a charm, hypnotic, if you will, for eye as well as ear. Here
is the new technique in all its nakedness, new in the sense of figure,
design, pattern, web, new in a harmonic way. The old order was
horrified at the modulatory harshness, the young sprigs of the new,
fascinated and a little frightened. A man who could explode a mine that
assailed the stars must be reckoned with. The nub of modern piano music
is in the study, the most formally reckless Chopin ever penned. Kullak
gives Chopin's favorite metronome sign, 176 to the quarter, but this
editor rightly believes that "the majestic grandeur is impaired," and
suggests 152 instead. The gain is at once apparent. Indeed Kullak, a
man of moderate pulse, is quite right in his strictures on the Chopin
tempi, tempi that sprang from the expressively light mechanism of the
prevailing pianos of Chopin's day. Von Bulow declares that "the
requisite suppleness of the hand in gradual extension and rapid
contraction will be most quickly attained if the player does not
disdain first of all to impress on the individual fingers the chord
which is the foundation of each arpeggio;" a sound pedagogic point. He
also inveighs against the disposition to play the octave basses
arpeggio. In fact, those basses are the argument of the play; they must
be granitic, ponderable and powerful. The same authority calls
attention to a misprint C, which he makes B flat, the last note treble
in the twenty-ninth bar. Von Bulow gives the Chopin metronomic marking.
It remained for Riemann to make some radical changes. This learned and
worthy doctor astonished the musical world a few years by his new marks
of phrasing in the Beethoven symphonies. They topsy-turvied the old
bowing. With Chopin, new dynamic and agogic accents are rather
dangerous, at least to the peace of mind of worshippers of the Chopin
fetish. Riemann breaks two bars into one. It is a finished period for
him, and by detaching several of the sixteenths in the first group, the
first and fourth, he makes the accent clearer,--at least to the eye. He
indicates alla breve with 88 to the half. In later studies examples
will be given of this phrasing, a phrasing that becomes a mannerism
with the editor. He offers no startling finger changes. The value of
his criticism throughout the volume seems to be in the phrasing, and
this by no means conforms to accepted notions of how Chopin should be
interpreted. I intend quoting more freely from Riemann than from the
others, but not for the reason that I consider him as a cloud by day
and a pillar of fire by night in the desirable land of the Chopin
fitudes, rather because his piercing analysis lays bare the very roots
of these shining examples of piano literature. Klindworth contents
himself with a straightforward version of the C major study, his
fingering being the clearest and most admirable. The Mikuli edition
makes one addition: it is a line which binds the last note of the first
group to the first of the second. The device is useful, and occurs only
on the upward flights of the arpeggio.
This study suggests that its composer wished to begin the exposition of
his wonderful technical system with a skeletonized statement. It is the
tree stripped of its bark, the flower of its leaves, yet, austere as is
the result, there is compensating power, dignity and unswerving logic.
This study is the key with which Chopin unlocked--not his heart, but
the kingdom of technique. It should be played, for variety, unisono,
with both hands, omitting, of course, the octave bass.
Von Bulow writes cannily enough, that the second study in A minor being
chromatically related to Moscheles' etude, op. 70, No. 3, that piece
should prepare the way for Chopin's more musical composition. In
different degrees of tempo, strength and rhythmic accent it should be
practised, omitting the thumb and first finger. Mikuli's metronome is
144 to the quarter, Von Bulow's, 114; Klindworth's, the same as Mikuli,
and Riemann is 72 to the half, with an alla breve. The fingering in
three of these authorities is almost identical. Riemann has ideas of
his own, both in the phrasing and figuration. Look at these first two
bars:
[Musical score excerpt without caption: ]
Von Bulow orders "the middle harmonies to be played throughout
distinctly, and yet transiently"--in German, "fluchtig." In fact, the
entire composition, with its murmuring, meandering, chromatic
character, is a forerunner to the whispering, weaving, moonlit effects
in some of his later studies. The technical purpose is clear, but not
obtrusive. It is intended for the fourth and fifth finger of the right
hand, but given in unison with both hands it becomes a veritable but
laudable torture for the thumb of the left. With the repeat of the
first at bar 36 Von Bulow gives a variation in fingering. Kullak's
method of fingering is this: "Everywhere that two white keys occur in
succession the fifth finger is to be used for C and F in the right
hand, and for F and E in the left." He has also something to say about
holding "the hand sideways, so that the back of the hand and arm form
an angle." This question of hand position, particularly in Chopin, is
largely a matter of individual formation. No two hands are alike, no
two pianists use the same muscular movements. Play along the easiest
line of resistance.
We now have reached a study, the third, in which the more intimately
known Chopin reveals himself. This one in E is among the finest
flowering of the composer's choice garden. It is simpler, less morbid,
sultry and languorous, therefore saner, than the much bepraised study
in C sharp minor, No. 7, op. 25. Niecks writes that this study "may be
counted among Chopin's loveliest compositions." It combines "classical
chasteness of contour with the fragrance of romanticism." Chopin told
his faithful Gutmann that "he had never in his life written another
such melody," and once when hearing it raised his arms aloft and cried
out: "Oh, ma patrie!"
I cannot vouch for the sincerity of Chopin's utterance for as Runciman
writes: "They were a very Byronic set, these young men; and they took
themselves with ludicrous seriousness."
Von Bulow calls it a study in expression--which is obvious--and thinks
it should be studied in company with No. 6, in E flat minor. This
reason is not patent. Emotions should not be hunted in couples and the
very object of the collection, variety in mood as well as mechanism, is
thus defeated. But Von Bulow was ever an ardent classifier. Perhaps he
had his soul compartmentized. He also attempts to regulate the
rubato--this is the first of the studies wherein the rubato's rights
must be acknowledged. The bars are even mentioned 32, 33, 36 and 37,
where tempo license may be indulged. But here is a case which innate
taste and feeling must guide. You can no more teach a real Chopin
rubato--not the mawkish imitation,--than you can make a donkey
comprehend Kant. The metronome is the same in all editions, 100 to the
eighth.
Kullak rightly calls this lovely study "ein wunderschones, poetisches
Tonstuck," more in the nocturne than study style. He gives in the
bravura-like cadenza, an alternate for small hands, but small hands
should not touch this piece unless they can grapple the double sixths
with ease. Klindworth fingers the study with great care. The figuration
in three of the editions is the same, Mikuli separating the voices
distinctly. Riemann exercises all his ingenuity to make the beginning
clear to the eye.
[Musical score excerpt]
What a joy is the next study, No. 4! How well Chopin knew the value of
contrast in tonality and sentiment! A veritable classic is this piece,
which, despite its dark key color, C sharp minor as a foil to the
preceding one in E, bubbles with life and spurts flame. It reminds one
of the story of the Polish peasants, who are happiest when they sing in
the minor mode. Kullak calls this "a bravura study for velocity and
lightness in both hands. Accentuation fiery!" while Von Bulow believes
that "the irresistible interest inspired by the spirited content of
this truly classical and model piece of music may become a stumbling
block in attempting to conquer the technical difficulties." Hardly. The
technics of this composition do not lie beneath the surface. They are
very much in the way of clumsy fingers and heavy wrists. Presto 88 to
the half is the metronome indication in all five editions. Klindworth
does not comment, but I like his fingering and phrasing best of all.
Riemann repeats his trick of breaking a group, detaching a note for
emphasis; although he is careful to retain the legato bow. One wonders
why this study does not figure more frequently on programmes of piano
recitals. It is a fine, healthy technical test, it is brilliant, and
the coda is very dramatic. Ten bars before the return of the theme
there is a stiff digital hedge for the student. A veritable lance of
tone is this study, if justly poised.
Riemann has his own ideas of the phrasing of the following one, the
fifth and familiar "Black Key" etude. Examine the first bar:
[Musical Illustration without caption]
Von Bulow would have grown jealous if he had seen this rather fantastic
phrasing. It is a trifle too finical, though it must be confessed looks
pretty. I like longer breathed phrasing. The student may profit by this
analysis. The piece is indeed, as Kullak says, "full of Polish
elegance." Von Bulow speaks rather disdainfully of it as a Damen-Salon
Etude. It is certainly graceful, delicately witty, a trifle naughty,
arch and roguish, and it is delightfully invented. Technically, it
requires smooth, velvet-tipped fingers and a supple wrist. In the
fourth bar, third group, third note of group, Klindworth and Riemann
print E flat instead of D flat. Mikuli, Kullak and Von Bulow use the D
flat. Now, which is right? The D flat is preferable. There are already
two E flats in the bar. The change is an agreeable one. Joseffy has
made a concert variation for this study. The metronome of the original
is given at 116 to the quarter.
A dark, doleful nocturne is No. 6, in E flat minor. Niecks praises it
in company with the preceding one in E. It is beautiful, if music so
sad may be called beautiful, and the melody is full of stifled sorrow.
The study figure is ingenious, but subordinated to the theme. In the E
major section the piece broadens to dramatic vigor. Chopin was not yet
the slave of his mood. There must be a psychical programme to this
study, some record of a youthful disillusion, but the expression of it
is kept well within chaste lines. The Sarmatian composer had not yet
unlearned the value of reserve. The Klindworth reading of this troubled
poem is the best though Kullak used Chopin's autographic copy. There is
no metronomic sign in this autograph. Tellefsen gives 69 to the
quarter; Klindworth, 60; Riemann, 69; Mikuli, the same; Von Bulow and
Kullak, 60. Kullak also gives several variante from the text, adding an
A flat to the last group in bar II. Riemann and the others make the
same addition. The note must have been accidentally omitted from the
Chopin autograph. Two bars will illustrate what Riemann can accomplish
when he makes up his mind to be explicit, leaving little to the
imagination:
[Illustration without caption]
A luscious touch, and a sympathetic soul is needed for this nocturne
study.
We emerge into a clearer, more bracing atmosphere in the C major study,
No. 7. It is a genuine toccata, with moments of tender twilight,
serving a distinct technical purpose--the study of double notes and
changing on one key--and is as healthy as the toccata by Robert
Schumann. Here is a brave, an undaunted Chopin, a gay cavalier, with
the sunshine shimmering about him. There are times when this study
seems like light dripping through the trees of a mysterious forest;
with the delicato there are Puck-like rustlings, and all the while the
pianist without imagination is exercising wrist and ringers in a
technical exercise! Were ever Beauty and Duty so mated in double
harness? Pegasus pulling a cloud charged with rain over an arid
country! For study, playing the entire composition with a wrist stroke
is advisable. It will secure clear articulation, staccato and
finger-memory. Von Bulow phrases the study in groups of two, Kullak in
sixes, Klindworth and Mikuli the same, while Riemann in alternate twos,
fours and sixes. One sees his logic rather than hears it. Von Bulow
plastically reproduces the flitting, elusive character of the study far
better than the others.
It is quite like him to suggest to the panting and ambitious pupil that
the performance in F sharp major, with the same fingering as the next
study in F, No. 8, would be beneficial. It certainly would. By the same
token, the playing of the F minor Sonata, the Appassionata of
Beethoven, in the key of F sharp minor, might produce good results.
This was another crotchet of Wagner's friend and probably was born of
the story that Beethoven transposed the Bach fugues in all keys. The
same is said of Saint-Saens.
In his notes to the F major study Theodor Kullak expatiates at length
upon his favorite idea that Chopin must not be played according to his
metronomic markings. The original autograph gives 96 to the half, the
Tellefsen edition 88, Klindworth 80, Von Bulow 89, Mikuli 88, and
Riemann the same. Kullak takes the slower tempo of Klindworth,
believing that the old Herz and Czerny ideals of velocity are vanished,
that the shallow dip of the keys in Chopin's day had much to do with
the swiftness and lightness of his playing. The noble, more sonorous
tone of a modern piano requires greater breadth of style and less
speedy passage work. There can be no doubt as to the wisdom of a
broader treatment of this charming display piece. How it makes the
piano sound--what a rich, brilliant sweep it secures! It elbows the
treble to its last euphonious point, glitters and crests itself, only
to fall away as if the sea were melodic and could shatter and tumble
into tuneful foam! The emotional content is not marked. The piece is
for the fashionable salon or the concert hall. One catches at its close
the overtones of bustling plaudits and the clapping of gloved palms.
Ductility, an aristocratic ease, a delicate touch and fluent technique
will carry off this study with good effect. Technically it is useful;
one must speak of the usefulness of Chopin, even in these imprisoned,
iridescent soap bubbles of his. On the fourth line and in the first bar
of the Kullak version, there is a chord of the dominant seventh in
dispersed position that does not occur in any other edition. Yet it
must be Chopin or one of his disciples, for this autograph is in the
Royal Library at Berlin. Kullak thinks it ought to be omitted, moreover
he slights an E flat, that occurs in all the other editions situated in
the fourth group of the twentieth bar from the end.
The F minor study, No. 9, is the first one of those tone studies of
Chopin in which the mood is more petulant than tempestuous. The melody
is morbid, almost irritating, and yet not without certain accents of
grandeur. There is a persistency in repetition that foreshadows the
Chopin of the later, sadder years. The figure in the left hand is the
first in which a prominent part is given to that member. Not as noble
and sonorous a figure as the one in the C minor study, it is a distinct
forerunner of the bass of the D minor Prelude. In this F minor study
the stretch is the technical object. It is rather awkward for
close-knit fingers. The best fingering is Von Bulow's. It is 5, 3, 1,
4, 1, 3 for the first figure. All the other editions, except Riemann's,
recommend the fifth finger on F, the fourth on C. Von Billow believes
that small hands beginning with his system will achieve quicker results
than by the Chopin fingering. This is true. Riemann phrases the study
with a multiplicity of legato bows and dynamic accents. Kullak prefers
the Tellefsen metronome 80, rather than the traditional 96. Most of the
others use 88 to the quarter, except Riemann, who espouses the more
rapid gait of 96. Klindworth, with his 88, strikes a fair medium.
The verdict of Von Bulow on the following study in A flat, No. 10, has
no uncertainty of tone in its proclamation:
He who can play this study in a really finished manner may
congratulate himself on having climbed to the highest point of
the pianist's Parnassus, as it is perhaps the most difficult
piece of the entire set. The whole repertory of piano music
does not contain a study of perpetuum mobile so full of genius
and fancy as this particular one is universally acknowledged
to be, except perhaps Liszt's Feux Follets. The most important
point would appear to lie not so much in the interchange of
the groups of legato and staccato as in the exercise of
rhythmic contrasts--the alternation of two and three part
metre (that is, of four and six) in the same bar. To overcome
this fundamental difficulty in the art of musical reproduction
is the most important thing here, and with true zeal it may
even be accomplished easily.
Kullak writes: "Harmonic anticipations; a rich rhythmic life
originating in the changing articulation of the twelve-eights in groups
of three and two each. ... This etude is an exceedingly piquant
composition, possessing for the hearer a wondrous, fantastic charm, if
played with the proper insight." The metronomic marking is practically
the same in all editions, 152 to the quarter notes. The study is one of
the most charming of the composer. There is more depth in it than in
the G flat and F major studies, and its effectiveness in the virtuoso
sense is unquestionable. A savor of the salon hovers over its perfumed
measures, but there is grace, spontaneity and happiness. Chopin must
have been as happy as his sensitive nature would allow when he
conceived this vivacious caprice.
In all the editions, Riemann's excepted, there is no doubt left as to
the alternations of metres. Here are the first few bars of Von
Billow's, which is normal phrasing:
[Musical score excerpt]
Read Riemann's version of these bars:
[Musical score excerpt]
Riemann is conducive to clear-sighted phrasing, and will set the
student thinking, but the general effect of accentuation is certainly
different. All the editors quoted agree with Von Bulow, Klindworth and
Kullak. But if this is a marked specimen of Riemann, examine his
reading of the phrase wherein Chopin's triple rhythm is supplanted by
duple. Thus Von Bulow--and who will dare cavil?
[Musical score excerpt]
Riemann:
[Musical score excerpt]
The difference is more imaginary than real, for the stems of the
accented notes give us the binary metre. But the illustration serves to
show how Dr. Riemann is disposed to refine upon the gold of Chopin.
Kullak dilates upon a peculiarity of Chopin: the dispersed position of
his underlying harmonies. This in a footnote to the eleventh study of
op. 10. Here one must let go the critical valve, else strangle in
pedagogics. So much has been written, so much that is false, perverted
sentimentalism and unmitigated cant about the nocturnes, that the
wonder is the real Chopin lover has not rebelled. There are pearls and
diamonds in the jewelled collection of nocturnes, many are dolorous,
few dramatic, and others are sweetly insane and songful. I yield to
none in my admiration for the first one of the two in G minor, for the
psychical despair in the C sharp minor nocturne, for that noble drama
called the C minor nocturne, for the B major, the Tuberose nocturne;
and for the E, D flat and G major nocturnes, it remains unabated. But
in the list there is no such picture painted, a Corot if ever there was
one, as this E flat study.
Its novel design, delicate arabesques--as if the guitar had been
dowered with a soul--and the richness and originality of its harmonic
scheme, gives us pause to ask if Chopin's invention is not almost
boundless. The melody itself is plaintive; a plaintive grace informs
the entire piece. The harmonization is far more wonderful, but to us
the chord of the tenth and more remote intervals, seem no longer
daring; modern composition has devilled the musical alphabet into the
very caverns of the grotesque, yet there are harmonies in the last page
of this study that still excite wonder. The fifteenth bar from the end
is one that Richard Wagner might have made. From that bar to the close,
every group is a masterpiece.
Remember, this study is a nocturne, and even the accepted metronomic
markings in most editions, 76 to the quarter, are not too slow; they
might even be slower. Allegretto and not a shade speedier! The color
scheme is celestial and the ending a sigh, not unmixed with happiness.
Chopin, sensitive poet, had his moments of peace, of divine
content--lebensruhe. The dizzy appoggiatura leaps in the last two bars
set the seal of perfection upon this unique composition.
Touching upon the execution, one may say that it is not for small
hands, nor yet for big fists. The former must not believe that any
"arrangements" or simplified versions will ever produce the aerial
effect, the swaying of the tendrils of tone, intended by Chopin. Very
large hands are tempted by their reach to crush the life out of the
study in not arpeggiating it. This I have heard, and the impression was
indescribably brutal. As for fingering, Mikuli, Von Bulow, Kullak,
Riemann and Klindworth all differ, and from them must most pianists
differ. Your own grasp, individual sense of fingering and tact will
dictate the management of technics. Von Bulow gives a very sensible
pattern to work from, and Kullak is still more explicit. He analyzes
the melody and, planning the arpeggiating with scrupulous fidelity, he
shows why the arpeggiating "must be affected with the utmost rapidity,
bordering upon simultaneousness of harmony in the case of many chords."
Kullak has something to say about the grace notes and this bids me call
your attention to Von Bulow's change in the appoggiatura at the last
return of the subject. A bad misprint is in the Von Bulow edition: it
is in the seventeenth bar from the end, the lowest note in the first
bass group and should read E natural, instead of the E flat that stands.
Von Bulow does not use the arpeggio sign after the first chord. He
rightly believes it makes unclear for the student the subtleties of
harmonic changes and fingering. He also suggests--quite like the
fertile Hans Guido--that "players who have sufficient patience and
enthusiasm for the task would find it worth their while to practise the
arpeggi the reverse way, from top to bottom; or in contrary motion,
beginning with the top note in one hand and the bottom note in the
other. A variety of devices like this would certainly help to give
greater finish to the task."
Doubtless, but consider: man's years are but threescore and ten!
The phrasing of the various editions examined do not vary much. Riemann
is excepted, who has his say in this fashion, at the beginning:
[Musical score excerpt]
More remarkable still is the diversity of opinion regarding the first
three bass chord groups in the fifteenth bar from the close: the bottom
notes in the Von Bulow and Klindworth editions are B flat and two A
naturals, and in the Riemann, Kullak and Mikuli editions the notes are
two B flats and one A natural. The former sounds more varied, but we
may suppose the latter to be correct because of Mikuli. Here is the
particular bar, as given by Riemann:
[Musical score excerpt]
Yet this exquisite flight into the blue, this nocturne which should be
played before sundown, excited the astonishment of Mendelssohn, the
perplexed wrath of Moscheles and the contempt of Rellstab, editor of
the "Iris," who wrote in that journal in 1834 of the studies in op.
10:--
"Those who have distorted fingers may put them right by practising
these studies; but those who have not, should not play them, at least
not without having a surgeon at hand." What incredible surgery would
have been needed to get within the skull of this narrow critic any
savor of the beauty of these compositions! In the years to come the
Chopin studies will be played for their music, without any thought of
their technical problems.
Now the young eagle begins to face the sun, begins to mount on
wind-weaving pinions. We have reached the last study of op. 10, the
magnificent one in C minor. Four pages suffice for a background upon
which the composer has flung with overwhelming fury the darkest, the
most demoniac expressions of his nature. Here is no veiled surmise, no
smothered rage, but all sweeps along in tornadic passion. Karasowski's
story may be true regarding the genesis of this work, but true or not,
it is one of the greatest dramatic outbursts in piano literature. Great
in outline, pride, force and velocity, it never relaxes its grim grip
from the first shrill dissonance to the overwhelming chordal close.
This end rings out like the crack of creation. It is elemental. Kullak
calls it a "bravura study of the very highest order for the left hand.
It was composed in 1831 in Stuttgart, shortly after Chopin had received
tidings of the taking of Warsaw by the Russians, September 8, 1831."
Karasowski wrote: "Grief, anxiety and despair over the fate of his
relatives and his dearly-beloved father filled the measure of his
sufferings. Under the influence of this mood he wrote the C minor
Etude, called by many the Revolutionary Etude. Out of the mad and
tempestuous storm of passages for the left hand the melody rises aloft,
now passionate and anon proudly majestic, until thrills of awe stream
over the listener, and the image is evoked of Zeus hurling thunderbolts
at the world."
Niecks thinks it "superbly grand," and furthermore writes: "The
composer seems fuming with rage; the left hand rushes impetuously along
and the right hand strikes in with passionate ejaculations." Von Bulow
said: "This C minor study must be considered a finished work of art in
an even higher degree than the study in C sharp minor." All of which is
pretty, but not enough to the point.
Von Bulow fingers the first passage for the left hand in a very
rational manner; Klindworth differs by beginning with the third instead
of the second finger, while Riemann--dear innovator--takes the group:
second, first, third, and then, the fifth finger on D, if you please!
Kullak is more normal, beginning with the third. Here is Riemann's
phrasing and grouping for the first few bars. Notice the half note with
peculiar changes of fingering at the end. It gives surety and variety.
Von Bulow makes the changes ring on the second and fifth, instead of
third and fifth, fingers. Thus Riemann:
[Musical score excerpt]
In the above the accustomed phrasing is altered, for in all other
editions the accent falls upon the first note of each group. In Riemann
the accentuation seems perverse, but there is no question as to its
pedagogic value. It may be ugly, but it is useful though I should not
care to hear it in the concert room. Another striking peculiarity of
the Riemann phrasing is his heavy accent on the top E flat in the
principal passage for the left hand. He also fingers what Von Bulow
calls the "chromatic meanderings," in an unusual manner, both on the
first page and the last. His idea of the enunciation of the first theme
is peculiar:
[Musical score excerpt]
Mikuli places a legato bow over the first three octaves--so does
Kullak--Von Bulow only over the last two, which gives a slightly
different effect, while Klindworth does the same as Kullak. The heavy
dynamic accents employed by Riemann are unmistakable. They signify the
vital importance of the phrase at its initial entrance. He does not use
it at the repetition, but throughout both dynamic and agogic accents
are unsparingly used, and the study seems to resound with the sullen
booming of a park of artillery. The working-out section, with its
anticipations of "Tristan and Isolde," is phrased by all the editors as
it is never played. Here the technical figure takes precedence over the
law of the phrase, and so most virtuosi place the accent on the fifth
finger, regardless of the pattern. This is as it should be. In
Klindworth there is a misprint at the beginning of the fifteenth bar
from the end in the bass. It should read B natural, not B flat. The
metronome is the same in all editions, 160 to the quarter, but speed
should give way to breadth at all hazards. Von Bulow is the only
editor, to my knowledge, who makes an enharmonic key change in this
working-out section. It looks neater, sounds the same, but is it
Chopin? He also gives a variant for public performance by transforming
the last run in unisono into a veritable hurricane by interlocked
octaves. The effect is brazen. Chopin needs no such clangorous padding
in this etude, which gains by legitimate strokes the most startling
contrasts.
The study is full of tremendous pathos; it compasses the sublime, and
in its most torrential moments the composer never quite loses his
mental equipoise. He, too, can evoke tragic spirits, and at will send
them scurrying back to their dim profound. It has but one rival in the
Chopin studies--No. 12, op. 25, in the same key.
II
Opus 25, twelve studies by Frederic Chopin, are dedicated to Madame la
Comtesse d'Agoult. The set opens with the familiar study in A flat, so
familiar that I shall not make further ado about it except to say that
it is delicious, but played often and badly. All that modern editing
can do since Miluki is to hunt out fresh accentuation. Von Bullow is
the worst sinner in this respect, for he discovers quaint nooks and
dells for his dynamics undreamed of by the composer. His edition should
be respectfully studied and, when mastered, discarded for a more poetic
interpretation. Above all, poetry, poetry and pedals. Without pedalling
of the most varied sort this study will remain as dry as a dog-gnawed
bone. Von Bulow says the "figure must be treated as a double
triplet--twice three and not three times two--as indicated in the first
two bars." Klindworth makes the group a sextolet. Von Bulow has set
forth numerous directions in fingering and phrasing, giving the exact
number of notes in the bass trill at the end. Kullak uses the most
ingenious fingering. Look at the last group of the last bar, second
line, third page. It is the last word in fingering. Better to end with
Robert Schumann's beautiful description of this study, as quoted by
Kullak:
In treating of the present book of Etudes, Robert Schumann,
after comparing Chopin to a strange star seen at midnight,
wrote as follows: "Whither his path lies and leads, or how
long, how brilliant its course is yet to be, who can say? As
often, however, as it shows itself, there is ever seen the
same deep dark glow, the same starry light and the same
austerity, so that even a child could not fail to recognize
it. But besides this, I have had the advantage of hearing most
of these Etudes played by Chopin himself, and quite a la
Chopin did he play them!"
Of the first one especially he writes: "Imagine that an
aeolian harp possessed all the musical scales, and that the
hand of an artist were to cause them all to intermingle in all
sorts of fantastic embellishments, yet in such a way as to
leave everywhere audible a deep fundamental tone and a soft
continuously-singing upper voice, and you will get the right
idea of his playing. But it would be an error to think that
Chopin permitted every one of the small notes to be distinctly
heard. It was rather an undulation of the A flat major chord,
here and there thrown aloft anew by the pedal. Throughout all
the harmonies one always heard in great tones a wondrous
melody, while once only, in the middle of the piece, besides
that chief song, a tenor voice became prominent in the midst
of chords. After the Etude a feeling came over one as of
having seen in a dream a beatific picture which when half
awake one would gladly recall."
After these words there can be no doubt as to the mode of
delivery. No commentary is required to show that the melodic
and other important tones indicated by means of large notes
must emerge from within the sweetly whispering waves, and that
the upper tones must be combined so as to form a real melody
with the finest and most thoughtful shadings.
The twenty-fourth bar of this study in A major is so Lisztian that
Liszt must have benefited by its harmonies.
"And then he played the second in the book, in F minor, one in which
his individuality displays itself in a manner never to be forgotten.
How charming, how dreamy it was! Soft as the song of a sleeping child."
Schumann wrote this about the wonderful study in F minor, which
whispers, not of baleful deeds in a dream, as does the last movement of
the B flat minor sonata, but is--"the song of a sleeping child." No
comparison could be prettier, for there is a sweet, delicate drone that
sometimes issues from childish lips, having a charm for ears not
attuned to grosser things.
This must have been the study that Chopin played for Henrietta Voigt at
Leipsic, September 12, 1836. In her diary she wrote: "The over
excitement of his fantastic manner is imparted to the keen eared. It
made me hold my breath. Wonderful is the ease with which his velvet
fingers glide, I might almost say fly, over the keys. He has enraptured
me--in a way which hitherto had been unknown to me. What delighted me
was the childlike, natural manner which he showed in his demeanor and
in his playing." Von Bulow believes the interpretation of this magical
music should be without sentimentality, almost without
shading--clearly, delicately and dreamily executed. "An ideal
pianissimo, an accentless quality, and completely without passion or
rubato." There is little doubt this was the way Chopin played it. Liszt
is an authority on the subject, and M. Mathias corroborates him.
Regarding the rhythmical problem to be overcome, the combination of two
opposing rhythms, Von Bulow indicates an excellent method, and Kullak
devotes part of a page to examples of how the right, then the left, and
finally both hands, are to be treated. Kullak furthermore writes: "Or,
if one will, he may also betake himself in fancy to a still, green,
dusky forest, and listen in profound solitude to the mysterious
rustling and whispering of the foliage. What, indeed, despite the
algebraic character of the tone-language, may not a lively fancy
conjure out of, or, rather, into, this etude! But one thing is to be
held fast: it is to be played in that Chopin-like whisper of which,
among others, Mendelssohn also affirmed that for him nothing more
enchanting existed." But enough of subjective fancies. This study
contains much beauty, and every bar rules over a little harmonic
kingdom of its own. It is so lovely that not even the Brahms'
distortion in double notes or the version in octaves can dull its
magnetic crooning. At times so delicate is its design that it recalls
the faint fantastic tracery made by frost on glass. In all instances
save one it is written as four unbroken quarter triplets in the
bar--right hand. Not so Riemann. He has views of his own, both as to
fingering and phrasing:
[Musical score excerpt]
Jean Kleczynski's interesting brochure, "The Works of Frederic Chopin
and Their Proper Interpretation," is made up of three lectures
delivered at Warsaw. While the subject is of necessity foreshortened,
he says some practical things about the use of the pedals in Chopin's
music. He speaks of this very study in F minor and the enchanting way
Rubinstein and Essipowa ended it--the echo-like effects on the four
C's, the pedal floating the tone. The pedals are half the battle in
Chopin playing. ONE CAN NEVER PLAY CHOPIN BEAUTIFULLY ENOUGH. Realistic
treatment dissipates his dream palaces, shatters his aerial
architecture. He may be played broadly, fervently, dramatically but
coarsely, never. I deprecate the rose-leaf sentimentalism in which he
is swathed by nearly all pianists. "Chopin is a sigh, with something
pleasing in it," wrote some one, and it is precisely this notion which
has created such havoc among his interpreters. But if excess in feeling
is objectionable, so too is the "healthy" reading accorded his works by
pianists with more brawn than brain. The real Chopin player is born and
can never be a product of the schools.
Schumann thinks the third study in F less novel in character, although
"here the master showed his admirable bravura powers." "But," he
continues, "they are all models of bold, indwelling, creative force,
truly poetic creations, though not without small blots in their
details, but on the whole striking and powerful. Yet, if I give my
complete opinion, I must confess that his earlier collection seems more
valuable to me. Not that I mean to imply any deterioration, for these
recently published studies were nearly all written at the same time as
the earlier ones, and only a few were composed a little while ago--the
first in A flat and the last magnificent one in C minor, both of which
display great mastership."
One may be permitted to disagree with Schumann, for op. 25 contains at
least two of Chopin's greater studies--A minor and C minor. The most
valuable point of the passage quoted is the clenching of the fact that
the studies were composed in a bunch. That settles many important
psychological details. Chopin had suffered much before going to Paris,
had undergone the purification and renunciation of an unsuccessful love
affair, and arrived in Paris with his style fully formed--in his case
the style was most emphatically the man.
Kullak calls the study in F "a spirited little caprice, whose kernel
lies in the simultaneous application of four different little rhythms
to form a single figure in sound, which figure is then repeated
continuously to the end. In these repetitions, however, changes of
accentuation, fresh modulations, and piquant antitheses, serve to make
the composition extremely vivacious and effective." He pulls apart the
brightly colored petals of the thematic flower and reveals the inner
chemistry of this delicate growth. Four different voices are
distinguished in the kernel.
"The third voice is the chief one, and after it the first, because they
determine the melodic and harmonic contents":
[Musical score excerpt of 'four different voices']
Kullak and Mikuli dot the C of the first bar. Klindworth and Von Bulow
do not. As to phrasing and fingering I pin my faith to Riemann. His
version is the most satisfactory. Here are the first bars. The idea is
clearly expressed:
[Musical score excerpt]
Best of all is the careful accentuation, and at a place indicated in no
other edition that I have examined. With the arrival of the
thirty-second notes, Riemann punctuates the theme this way:
[Musical score excerpt]
The melody, of course in profile, is in the eighth notes. This gives
meaning to the decorative pattern of the passage. And what charm,
buoyancy, and sweetness there is in this caprice! It has the
tantalizing, elusive charm of a humming bird in full flight. The human
element is almost eliminated. We are in the open, the sun blazes in the
blue, and all is gay, atmospheric, and illuding. Even where the tone
deepens, where the shadows grow cooler and darker in the B major
section, there is little hint of preoccupation with sadness. Subtle are
the harmonic shifts, admirable the ever changing devices of the
figuration. Riemann accents the B, the E, A, B flat, C and F, at the
close--perilous leaps for the left hand, but they bring into fine
relief the exquisite harmonic web. An easy way of avoiding the tricky
position in the left hand at this spot--thirteen bars from the
close--is to take the upper C in bass with the right hand thumb and in
the next bar the upper B in bass the same way. This minimizes the risk
of the skip, and it is perfectly legitimate to do this--in public at
least. The ending, to be "breathed" away, according to Kullak, is
variously fingered. He also prescribes a most trying fingering for the
first group, fourth finger on both hands. This is useful for study, but
for performance the third finger is surer. Von Bulow advises the player
to keep the "upper part of the body as still as possible, as any haste
of movement would destroy the object in view, which is the acquisition
of a loose wrist." He also suggests certain phrasing in bar seventeen,
and forbids a sharp, cutting manner in playing the sforzati at the last
return of the subject. Kullak is copious in his directions, and thinks
the touch should be light and the hand gliding, and in the B major part
"fiery, wilful accentuation of the inferior beats." Capricious,
fantastic, and graceful, this study is Chopin in rare spirits. Schumann
has the phrase--the study should be executed with "amiable bravura."
There is a misprint in the Kullak edition: at the beginning of the
thirty-second notes an A instead of an F upsets the tonality, besides
being absurd.
Of the fourth study in A minor there is little to add to Theodor
Kullak, who writes:
"In the broadest sense of the word, every piece of music is an
etude. In a narrower sense, however, we demand of an etude
that it shall have a special end in view, promote facility in
something, and lead to the conquest of some particular
difficulty, whether of technics, of rhythm, expression or
delivery." (Robert Schumann, Collected Writings, i., 201.) The
present study is less interesting from a technical than a
rhythmical point of view. While the chief beats of the measure
(1st, 3d, 5th and 7th eighths) are represented only by single
tones (in the bass part), which are to a certain extent "free
and unconcerned, and void of all encumbrance," the inferior
parts of the measure (2d, 4th, 6th and 8th eighths) are
burdened with chords, the most of which, moreover, are
provided with accents in opposition to the regular beats of
the measure. Further, there is associated with these chords,
or there may be said to grow out of them, a cantilene in the
upper voice, which appears in syncopated form opposite to the
strong beats of the bass. This cantilene begins on a weak
beat, and produces numerous suspensions, which, in view of the
time of their entrance, appear as so many retardations and
delayals of melodic tones.
All these things combine to give the composition a wholly
peculiar coloring, to render its flow somewhat restless and to
stamp the etude as a little characteristic piece, a capriccio,
which might well be named "Inquietude."
As regards technics, two things are to be studied: the
staccato of the chords and the execution of the cantilena. The
chords must be formed more by pressure than by striking. The
fingers must support themselves very lightly upon the chord
keys and then rise again with the back of the hand in the most
elastic manner. The upward movement of the hand must be very
slight. Everything must be done with the greatest precision,
and not merely in a superficial manner. Where the cantilena
appears, every melodic tone must stand apart from the tones of
the accompaniment as if in "relief." Hence the fingers for the
melodic tones must press down the keys allotted to them with
special force, in doing which the back of the hand may be
permitted to turn lightly to the right (sideward stroke),
especially when there is a rest in the accompaniment. Compare
with this etude the introduction to the Capriccio in B minor,
with orchestra, by Felix Mendelssohn, first page. Aside from a
few rallentando places, the etude is to be played strictly in
time.
I prefer the Klindworth editing of this rather sombre, nervous
composition, which may be merely an etude, but it also indicates a
slightly pathologic condition. With its breath-catching syncopations
and narrow emotional range, the A minor study has nevertheless moments
of power and interest. Riemann's phrasing, while careful, is not more
enlightening than Klindworth's. Von Bulow says: "The bass must be
strongly marked throughout--even when piano--and brought out in
imitation of the upper part." Singularly enough, his is the only
edition in which the left hand arpeggios at the close, though in the
final bar "both hands may do so." This is editorial quibbling. Stephen
Heller remarked that this study reminded him of the first bar of the
Kyrie--rather the Requiem Aeternam of Mozart's Requiem.
It is safe to say that the fifth study in E minor is less often heard
in the concert room than any one of its companions. I cannot recall
having heard it since Annette Essipowa gave that famous recital during
which she played the entire twenty-seven studies. Yet it is a sonorous
piano piece, rich in embroideries and general decorative effect in the
middle section. Perhaps the rather perverse, capricious and not
altogether amiable character of the beginning has caused pianists to be
wary of introducing it at a recital. It is hugely effective and also
difficult, especially if played with the same fingering throughout, as
Von Bulow suggests. Niecks quotes Stephen Heller's partiality for this
very study. In the "Gazette Musicale," February 24, 1839, Heller wrote
of Chopin's op. 25:
What more do we require to pass one or several evenings in as
perfect a happiness as possible? As for me, I seek in this
collection of poesy--this is the only name appropriate to the
works of Chopin--some favorite pieces which I might fix in my
memory, rather than others. Who could retain everything? For
this reason I have in my notebook quite particularly marked
the numbers four, five and seven of the present poems. Of
these twelve much loved studies--every one of which has a
charm of its own--the three numbers are those I prefer to all
the rest.
The middle part of this E minor study recalls Thalberg. Von Bulow
cautions the student against "the accenting of the first note with the
thumb--right hand--as it does not form part of the melody, but only
comes in as an unimportant passing note." This refers to the melody in
E. He also writes that the addition of the third in the left hand,
Klindworth edition, needs no special justification. I discovered one
marked difference in the Klindworth edition. The leap in the left
hand--first variant of the theme, tenth bar from beginning--is preceded
by an appoggiatura, E natural. The jump is to F sharp, instead of G, as
in the Mikuli, Kullak and Riemann editions. Von Bulow uses the F sharp,
but without the ninth below. Riemann phrases the piece so as to get the
top melody, B, E and G, and his stems are below instead of above, as in
Mikuli and Von Bulow. Kullak dots the eighth note. Riemann uses a
sixteenth, thus:
[Musical score excerpt]
Kullak writes that the figure 184 is not found on the older metronomes.
This is not too fast for the capriccio, with its pretty and ingenious
rhythmical transformations. As regards the execution of the 130th bar,
Von Bulow says: "The acciaccature--prefixes--are to be struck
simultaneously with the other parts, as also the shake in bar 134 and
following bars; this must begin with the upper auxiliary note." These
details are important. Kullak concludes his notes thus:
Despite all the little transformations of the motive member
which forms the kernel, its recognizability remains
essentially unimpaired. Meanwhile out of these little
metamorphoses there is developed a rich rhythmic life, which
the performer must bring out with great precision. If in
addition, he possesses a fine feeling for what is graceful,
coquettish, or agreeably capricious, he will understand how to
heighten still further the charm of the chief part, which, as
far as its character is concerned, reminds one of Etude, op.
25, No. 3.
The secondary part, in major, begins. Its kernel is formed of
a beautiful broad melody, which, if soulfully conceived and
delivered, will sing its way deep into the heart of the
listener. For the accompaniment in the right hand we find
chord arpeggiations in triplets, afterward in sixteenths,
calmly ascending and descending, and surrounding the melody as
with a veil. They are to be played almost without
accentuation.
It was Louis Ehlert who wrote of the celebrated study in G sharp minor
op. 25, No. 6: "Chopin not only versifies an exercise in thirds; he
transforms it into such a work of art that in studying it one could
sooner fancy himself on Parnassus than at a lesson. He deprives every
passage of all mechanical appearance by promoting it to become the
embodiment of a beautiful thought, which in turn finds graceful
expression in its motion."
And indeed in the piano literature no more remarkable merging of matter
and manner exists. The means justifies the end, and the means employed
by the composer are beautiful, there is no other word to describe the
style and architectonics of this noble study. It is seldom played in
public because of its difficulty. With the Schumann Toccata, the G
sharp minor study stands at the portals of the delectable land of
Double Notes. Both compositions have a common ancestry in the Czerny
Toccata, and both are the parents of such a sensational offspring as
Balakirew's "Islamey." In reading through the double note studies for
the instrument it is in the nature of a miracle to come upon Chopin's
transfiguration of such a barren subject. This study is first music,
then a technical problem. Where two or three pianists are gathered
together in the name of Chopin, the conversation is bound to formulate
itself thus: "How do you finger the double chromatic thirds in the G
sharp minor study?" That question answered, your digital politics are
known. You are classified, ranged. If you are heterodox you are eagerly
questioned; if you follow Von Bulow and stand by the Czerny fingering,
you are regarded as a curiosity. As the interpretation of the study is
not taxing, let us examine the various fingerings. First, a fingering
given by Leopold Godowsky. It is for double chromatic thirds:
[Musical score excerpt]
You will now be presented with a battalion of authorities, so that you
may see at a glance the various efforts to climb those slippery
chromatic heights. Here is Mikuli:
[Musical score excerpt]
Kullak's is exactly the same as above. It is the so-called Chopin
fingering, as contrasted with the so-called Czerny fingering--though in
reality Clementi's, as Mr. John Kautz contends. "In the latter the
third and fifth fingers fall upon C sharp and E and F sharp and A in
the right hand, and upon C and E flat and G and B flat in the left."
Klindworth also employs the Chopin fingering. Von Bulow makes this
statement: "As the peculiar fingering adopted by Chopin for chromatic
scales in thirds appears to us to render their performance in
legatissimo utterly unattainable on our modern instruments, we have
exchanged it, where necessary, for the older method of Hummel. Two of
the greatest executive artists of modern times, Alexander Dreyschock
and Carl Tausig, were, theoretically and practically, of the same
opinion. It is to be conjectured that Chopin was influenced in his
method of fingering by the piano of his favorite makers, Pleyel and
Wolff, of Paris--who, before they adopted the double echappement,
certainly produced instruments with the most pliant touch possible--and
therefore regarded the use of the thumb in the ascending scale on two
white keys in succession--the semitones EF and BC--as practicable. On
the grand piano of the present day we regard it as irreconcilable with
conditions of crescendo legato." This Chopin fingering in reality
derives directly from Hummel. See his "Piano School."
So he gives this fingering:
[Musical score excerpt]
He also suggests the following phrasing for the left hand. This is
excellent:
[Musical score excerpt]
Riemann not only adopts new fingering for the double note scale, but
also begins the study with the trill on first and third, second and
fourth, instead of the usual first and fourth, second and fifth
fingers, adopted by the rest. This is his notion of the run in
chromatic thirds:
[Musical score excerpt]
For the rest the study must be played like the wind, or, as Kullak
says: "Apart from a few places and some accents, the Etude is to be
played almost throughout in that Chopin whisper. The right hand must
play its thirds, especially the diatonic and chromatic scales, with
such equality that no angularity of motion shall be noticeable where
the fingers pass under or over each other. The left hand, too, must
receive careful attention and special study. The chord passages and all
similar ones must be executed discreetly and legatissimo. Notes with
double stems must be distinguished from notes with single stems by
means of stronger shadings, for they are mutually interconnected."
Von Bulow calls the seventh study, the one in C sharp minor, a
nocturne--a duo for 'cello and flute. He ingeniously smooths out the
unequal rhythmic differences of the two hands, and justly says the
piece does not work out any special technical matter. This study is the
most lauded of all. Yet I cannot help agreeing with Niecks, who writes
of it--he oddly enough places it in the key of E: "A duet between a He
and a She, of whom the former shows himself more talkative and emphatic
than the latter, is, indeed, very sweet, but, perhaps, also somewhat
tiresomely monotonous, as such tete-a-tetes naturally are to third
parties."
For Chopin's contemporaries this was one of his greatest efforts.
Heller wrote: "It engenders the sweetest sadness, the most enviable
torments, and if in playing it one feels oneself insensibly drawn
toward mournful and melancholy ideas, it is a disposition of the soul
which I prefer to all others. Alas! how I love these sombre and
mysterious dreams, and Chopin is the god who creates them." In this
etude Kleczynski thinks there are traces of weariness of life, and
quotes Orlowski, Chopin's friend, "He is only afflicted with
homesickness." Willeby calls this study the most beautiful of them all.
For me it is both morbid and elegiac. There is nostalgia in it, the
nostalgia of a sick, lacerated soul. It contains in solution all the
most objectionable and most endearing qualities of the master. Perhaps
we have heard its sweet, highly perfumed measures too often. Its
interpretation is a matter of taste. Kullak has written the most
ambitious programme for it. Here is a quotation from Albert R. Parsons'
translation in Schirmer's edition of Kullak.
Throughout the entire piece an elegiac mood prevails. The
composer paints with psychologic truthfulness a fragment out
of the life of a deeply clouded soul. He lets a broken heart,
filled with grief, proclaim its sorrow in a language of pain
which is incapable of being misunderstood. The heart has
lost--not something, but everything. The tones, however, do not
always bear the impress of a quiet, melancholy resignation.
More passionate impulses awaken, and the still plaint becomes
a complaint against cruel fate. It seeks the conflict, and
tries through force of will to burst the fetters of pain, or
at least to alleviate it through absorption in a happy past.
But in vain! The heart has not lost something--it has lost
everything. The musical poem divides into three, or if one
views the little episode in B major as a special part, into
four parts (strophes), of which the last is an elaborated
repetition of the first with a brief closing part appended.
The whole piece is a song, or, better still, an aria, in which
two principal voices are to be brought out; the upper one is
in imitation of a human voice, while the lower one must bear
the character throughout of an obligato violoncello. It is
well known that Chopin was very fond of the violoncello and
that in his piano compositions he imitated the style of
passages peculiar to that instrument. The two voices
correspond closely, supplementing and imitating each other
reciprocally. Between the two a third element exists: an
accompaniment of eighths in uniform succession without any
significance beyond that of filling out the harmony. This
third element is to be kept wholly subordinate. The little,
one-voiced introduction in recitative style which precedes the
aria reminds one vividly of the beginning of the Ballade in G
minor, op. 23.
The D flat study, No. 8, is called by Von Bulow "the most useful
exercise in the whole range of etude literature. It might truly be
called 'l'indispensable du pianiste,' if the term, through misuse, had
not fallen into disrepute. As a remedy for stiff fingers and
preparatory to performing in public, playing it six times through is
recommended, even to the most expert pianist." Only six times! The
separate study of the left hand is recommended. Kullak finds this study
"surprisingly euphonious, but devoid of depth of content." It is an
admirable study for the cultivation of double sixths. It contains a
remarkable passage of consecutive fifths that set the theorists by the
ears. Riemann manages to get some new editorial comment upon it.
The nimble study, No. 9, which bears the title of "The Butterfly," is
in G flat Von Bulow transposes it enharmonically to F sharp, avoiding
numerous double flats. The change is not laudable. He holds anything
but an elevated opinion of the piece, classing it with a composition of
the Charles Mayer order. This is unjust; the study if not deep is
graceful and certainly very effective. It has lately become the
stamping ground for the display of piano athletics. Nearly all modern
virtuosi pull to pieces the wings of this gay little butterfly. They
smash it, they bang it, and, adding insult to cruelty, they finish it
with three chords, mounting an octave each time, thus giving a
conventional character to the close--the very thing the composer
avoids. Much distorted phrasing is also indulged in. The Tellefsen's
edition and Klindworth's give these differences:
[Musical score excerpt]
Mikuli, Von Bulow and Kullak place the legato bow over the first three
notes of the group. Riemann, of course, is different:
[Musical score excerpt]
The metronomic markings are about the same in all editions.
Asiatic wildness, according to Von Bulow, pervades the B minor study,
op. 25, No. 10, although Willeby claims it to be only a study in
octaves "for the left hand"! Von Bulow furthermore compares it, because
of its monophonic character, to the Chorus of Dervishes in Beethoven's
"Ruins of Athens." Niecks says it is "a real pandemonium; for a while
holier sounds intervene, but finally hell prevails." The study is for
Kullak "somewhat far fetched and forced in invention, and leaves one
cold, although it plunges on wildly to the end." Von Bulow has made the
most complete edition. Klindworth strengthens the first and the seventh
eighth notes of the fifth bar before the last by filling in the
harmonics of the left hand. This etude is an important one,
technically; because many pianists make little of it that does not
abate its musical significance, and I am almost inclined to group it
with the last two studies of this opus. The opening is portentous and
soon becomes a driving whirlwind of tone. Chopin has never penned a
lovelier melody than the one in B--the middle section of this etude--it
is only to be compared to the one in the same key in the B minor
Scherzo, while the return to the first subject is managed as
consummately as in the E flat minor Scherzo, from op. 35. I confess to
being stirred by this B minor study, with its tempo at a forced draught
and with its precipitous close. There is a lushness about the octave
melody; the tune may be a little overripe, but it is sweet, sensuous
music, and about it hovers the hush of a rich evening in early autumn.
And now the "Winter Wind"--the study in A minor, op. 25, No. 11. Here
even Von Bulow becomes enthusiastic:
"It must be mentioned as a particular merit of this, the longest and,
in every respect, the grandest of Chopin's studies, that, while
producing the greatest fulness of sound imaginable, it keeps itself so
entirely and utterly unorchestral, and represents piano music in the
most accurate sense of the word. To Chopin is due the honor and credit
of having set fast the boundary between piano and orchestral music,
which through other composers of the romantic school, especially Robert
Schumann, has been defaced and blotted out, to the prejudice and damage
of both species."
Kullak is equally as warm in his praise of it:
One of the grandest and most ingenious of Chopin's etudes, and
a companion piece to op. 10, No. 12, which perhaps it even
surpasses. It is a bravura study of the highest order; and is
captivating through the boldness and originality of its
passages, whose rising and falling waves, full of agitation,
overflow the entire keyboard; captivating through its harmonic
and modulatory shadings; and captivating, finally, through a
wonderfully invented little theme which is drawn like a "red
thread" through all the flashing and glittering waves of tone,
and which, as it were, prevents them from scattering to all
quarters of the heavens. This little theme, strictly speaking
only a phrase of two measures, is, in a certain sense, the
motto which serves as a superscription for the etude,
appearing first one voiced, and immediately afterward four
voiced. The slow time (Lento) shows the great importance which
is to be attached to it. They who have followed thus far and
agree with what has been said cannot be in doubt concerning
the proper artistic delivery. To execute the passages quite in
the rapid time prescribed one must possess a finished
technique. Great facility, lightness of touch, equality,
strength and endurance in the forte passages, together with
the clearest distinctness in the piano and pianissimo--all of
this must have been already achieved, for the interpreter must
devote his whole attention to the poetic contents of the
composition, especially to the delivery of the march-like
rhythms, which possess a life of their own, appearing now calm
and circumspect, and anon bold and challenging. The march-like
element naturally requires strict playing in time.
This study is magnificent, and moreover it is music.
In bar fifteen Von Bulow makes B natural the second note of the last
group, although all other editions, except Klindworth, use a B flat.
Von Bulow has common sense on his side. The B flat is a misprint. The
same authority recommends slow staccato practice, with the lid of the
piano closed. Then the hurly-burly of tone will not intoxicate the
player and submerge his critical faculty.
Each editor has his notion of the phrasing of the initial sixteenths.
Thus Mikuli's--which is normal:
[Musical score excerpt]
Klindworth fingers this passage more ingeniously, but phrases it about
the same, omitting the sextolet mark. Kullak retains it. Von Bulow
makes his phrase run in this fashion:
[Musical score excerpt]
As regards grouping, Riemann follows Von Bulow, but places his accents
differently.
The canvas is Chopin's largest--for the idea and its treatment are on a
vastly grander scale than any contained in the two concertos. The
latter are after all miniatures, precious ones if you will, joined and
built with cunning artifice; in neither work is there the resistless
overflow of this etude, which has been compared to the screaming of the
winter blasts. Ah, how Chopin puts to flight those modern men who
scheme out a big decorative pattern and then have nothing wherewith to
fill it! He never relaxes his theme, and its fluctuating surprises are
many. The end is notable for the fact that scales appear. Chopin very
seldom uses scale figures in his studies. From Hummel to Thalberg and
Herz the keyboard had glittered with spangled scales. Chopin must have
been sick of them, as sick of them as of the left-hand melody with
arpeggiated accompaniment in the right, a la Thalberg. Scales had been
used too much, hence Chopin's sparing employment of them. In the first
C sharp minor study, op. 10, there is a run for the left hand in the
coda. In the seventh study, same key, op. 25, there are more. The
second study of op. 10, in A minor, is a chromatic scale study; but
there are no other specimens of the form until the mighty run at the
conclusion of this A minor study.
It takes prodigious power and endurance to play this work, prodigious
power, passion and no little poetry. It is open air music, storm music,
and at times moves in processional splendor. Small souled men, no
matter how agile their fingers, should avoid it.
The prime technical difficulty is the management of the thumb. Kullak
has made a variant at the end for concert performance. It is effective.
The average metronomic marking is sixty-nine to the half.
Kullak thinks the twelfth and last study of op. 25 in C minor "a grand,
magnificent composition for practice in broken chord passages for both
hands, which requires no comment." I differ from this worthy teacher.
Rather is Niecks more to my taste: "No. 12, C minor, in which the
emotions rise not less high than the waves of arpeggios which symbolize
them."
Von Bulow is didactic:
The requisite strength for this grandiose bravura study can
only be attained by the utmost clearness, and thus only by a
gradually increasing speed. It is therefore most desirable to
practise it piano also by way of variety, for otherwise the
strength of tone might easily degenerate into hardness, and in
the poetic striving after a realistic portrayal of a storm on
the piano the instrument, as well as the piece, would come to
grief.
The pedal is needful to give the requisite effect, and must
change with every new harmony; but it should only be used in
the latter stages of study, when the difficulties are nearly
mastered.
We have our preferences. Mine in op. 25 is the C minor study, which,
like the prelude in D minor, is "full of the sound of great guns."
Willeby thinks otherwise. On page 81 in his life of Chopin he has the
courage to write: "Had Professor Niecks applied the term monotonous to
No. 12 we should have been more ready to indorse his opinion, as,
although great power is manifested, the very 'sameness' of the form of
the arpeggio figure causes a certain amount of monotony to be felt."
The C minor study is, in a degree, a return to the first study in C.
While the idea in the former is infinitely nobler, more dramatic and
tangible, there is in the latter naked, primeval simplicity, the larger
eloquence, the elemental puissance. Monotonous? A thousand times no!
Monotonous as is the thunder and spray of the sea when it tumbles and
roars on some sullen, savage shore. Beethov-ian, in its ruggedness, the
Chopin of this C minor study is as far removed from the musical
dandyisms of the Parisian drawing rooms as is Beethoven himself. It is
orchestral in intention and a true epic of the piano.
Riemann places half notes at the beginning of each measure, as a
reminder of the necessary clinging of the thumbs. I like Von Bulow's
version the best of all. His directions are most minute. He gives the
Liszt method of working up the climax in octave triplets. How Liszt
must have thundered through this tumultuous work! Before it all
criticism should be silenced that fails to allow Chopin a place among
the greatest creative musicians. We are here in the presence of Chopin
the musician, not Chopin the composer for piano.
III
In 1840, Trois Nouvelles Etudes, by Frederic Chopin, appeared in the
"Methode des Methodes pour le piano," by F. J. Fetis and I. Moscheles.
It was odd company for the Polish composer. "Internal evidence seems to
show," writes Niecks, "that these weakest of the master's
studies--which, however, are by no means uninteresting and certainly
very characteristic--may be regarded more than op. 25 as the outcome of
a gleaning."
The last decade has added much to the artistic stature of these three
supplementary studies. They have something of the concision of the
Preludes. The first is a masterpiece. In F minor the theme in triplet
quarters, broad, sonorous and passionate, is unequally pitted against
four-eight notes in the bass. The technical difficulty to be overcome
is purely rhythmic, and Kullak takes pains to show how it may be
overcome. It is the musical, the emotional content of the study that
fascinates. The worthy editor calls it a companion piece to the F minor
study in op. 25. The comparison is not an apt one. Far deeper is this
new study, and although the doors never swing quite open, we divine the
tragic issues concealed.
Beautiful in a different way is the A flat study which follows. Again
the problem is a rhythmical one, and again the composer demonstrates
his exhaustless invention and his power of evoking a single mood,
viewing all its lovely contours and letting it melt away like dream
magic. Full of gentle sprightliness and lingering sweetness is this
study. Chopin has the hypnotic quality more than any composer of the
century, Richard Wagner excepted. After you have enjoyed playing this
study read Kullak and his "triplicity in biplicity." It may do you
good, and it will not harm the music.
In all the editions save one that I have seen the third study in D flat
begins on A flat, like the famous Valse in D flat. The exception is
Klindworth, who starts with B flat, the note above. The study is full
of sunny, good humor, spiritualized humor, and leaves the most cheering
impression after its performance. Its technical object is a
simultaneous legato and staccato. The result is an idealized Valse in
allegretto tempo, the very incarnation of joy, tempered by aristocratic
reserve. Chopin never romps, but he jests wittily, and always in
supremely good taste. This study fitly closes his extraordinary labors
in this form, and it is as if he had signed it "F. Chopin, et ego in
Arcady."
Among the various editions let me recommend Klindworth for daily usage,
while frequent reference to Von Bulow, Riemann and Kullak cannot fail
to prove valuable, curious and interesting.
Of the making of Chopin editions there is seemingly no end. In 1894 I
saw in manuscript some remarkable versions of the Chopin Studies by
Leopold Godowsky. The study in G sharp minor was the first one
published and played in public by this young pianist Unlike the Brahms
derangements, they are musical but immensely difficult. Topsy-turvied
as are the figures, a Chopin, even if lop-sided, hovers about,
sometimes with eye-brows uplifted, sometimes with angry, knitted
forehead and not seldom amused to the point of smiling. You see his
narrow shoulders, shrugged in the Polish fashion as he examines the
study in double-thirds transposed to the left hand! Curiously enough
this transcription, difficult as it is, does not tax the fingers as
much as a bedevilment of the A minor, op. 25, No. 4, which is extremely
difficult, demanding color discrimination and individuality of finger.
More breath-catching, and a piece at which one must cry out: "Hats off,
gentlemen! A tornado!" is the caprice called "Badinage." But if it is
meant to badinage, it is no sport for the pianist of everyday technical
attainments. This is formed of two studies. In the right hand is the G
flat study, op. 25, No. 9, and in the left the black key study, op. 10,
No. 5. The two go laughing through the world like old friends; brother
and sister they are tonally, trailing behind them a cloud of iridescent
glory. Godowsky has cleverly combined the two, following their melodic
curves as nearly as is possible. In some places he has thickened the
harmonies and shifted the "black key" figures to the right hand. It is
the work of a remarkable pianist. This is the way it looks on paper at
the beginning:
[Musical llustration]
The same study G flat, op. 10, No. 5, is also treated separately, the
melody being transferred to the treble. The Butterfly octaves, in
another study, are made to hop nimbly along in the left hand, and the C
major study, op. 10, No. 7, Chopin's Toccata, is arranged for the left
hand, and seems very practical and valuable. Here the adapter has
displayed great taste and skill, especially on the third page. The
pretty musical idea is not destroyed, but viewed from other points of
vantage. Op. 10, No. 2, is treated like a left hand study, as it should
be. Chopin did not always give enough work to the left hand, and the
first study of this opus in C is planned on brilliant lines for both
hands. Ingenious is the manipulation of the seldom played op. 25, No.
5, in E minor. As a study in rhythms and double notes it is very
welcome. The F minor study, op. 25, No. 2, as considered by the
ambidextrous Godowsky, is put in the bass, where it whirrs along to the
melodic encouragement of a theme of the paraphraser's own, in the
right. This study has suffered the most of all, for Brahms, in his
heavy, Teutonic way, set it grinding double sixths, while Isidor
Philipp, in his "Studies for the Left Hand," has harnessed it to sullen
octaves. This Frenchman, by the way, has also arranged for left hand
alone the G sharp minor, the D flat double sixths, the A minor--"Winter
Wind"--studies, the B flat minor prelude, and, terrible to relate, the
last movement of the Chopin B flat minor Sonata.
Are the Godowsky transcriptions available? Certainly. In ten years--so
rapid is the technical standard advancing--they will be used in the
curriculum of students. Whether he has treated Chopin with reverence I
leave my betters to determine. What has reverence to do with the case,
anyhow? Plato is parsed in the schoolroom, and Beethoven taught in
conservatories! Therefore why worry over the question of Godowsky's
attitude! Besides, he is writing for the next generation--presumably a
generation of Rosenthals.
And now, having passed over the salt and stubbly domain of pedagogics,
what is the dominant impression gleaned from the twenty-seven Chopin
studies? Is it not one of admiration, tinged with wonder at such a
prodigal display of thematic and technical invention? Their variety is
great, the aesthetic side is nowhere neglected for the purely
mechanical, and in the most poetic of them stuff may be found for
delicate fingers. Astounding, canorous, enchanting, alembicated and
dramatic, the Chopin studies are exemplary essays in emotion and
manner. In them is mirrored all of Chopin, the planetary as well as the
secular Chopin. When most of his piano music has gone the way of all
things fashioned by mortal hands, these studies will endure, will stand
for the nineteenth century as Beethoven crystallized the eighteenth,
Bach the seventeenth centuries in piano music. Chopin is a classic.
VII. MOODS IN MINIATURE:--THE PRELUDES.
The Preludes bear the opus number 28 and are dedicated to J. C.
Kessler, a composer of well-known piano studies. It is only the German
edition that bears his name, the French and English being inscribed by
Chopin "a son ami Pleyel." As Pleyel advanced the pianist 2,000 francs
for the Preludes he had a right to say: "These are my Preludes." Niecks
is authority for Chopin's remark: "I sold the Preludes to Pleyel
because he liked them." This was in 1838, when Chopin's health demanded
a change of climate. He wished to go to Majorca with Madame Sand and
her children, and had applied for money to the piano maker and
publisher, Camille Pleyel. He received but five hundred francs in
advance, the balance being paid on delivery of the manuscript.
The Preludes were published in 1839, yet there is internal evidence
which proves that most of them had been composed before the trip to the
Balearic Islands. This will upset the very pretty legend of music
making at the monastery of Valdemosa. Have we not all read with sweet
credulity the eloquent pages in George Sand in which the storm is
described that overtook the novelist and her son Maurice? After
terrible trials, dangers and delays, they reached their home and found
Chopin at the piano. Uttering a cry, he arose and stared at the pair.
"Ah! I knew well that you were dead." It was the sixth prelude, the one
in B minor, that he played, and dreaming, as Sand writes, that "he saw
himself drowned in a lake; heavy, ice cold drops of water fell at
regular intervals upon his breast; and when I called his attention to
those drops of water which were actually falling upon the roof, he
denied having heard them. He was even vexed at what I translated by the
term, imitative harmony. He protested with all his might, and he was
right, against the puerility of these imitations for the ear. His
genius was full of mysterious harmonies of nature."
Yet this prelude was composed previous to the Majorcan episode. "The
Preludes," says Niecks, "consist--to a great extent, at least--of
pickings from the composer's portfolios, of pieces, sketches and
memoranda written at various times and kept to be utilized when
occasion might offer."
Gutmann, Chopin's pupil, who nursed him to the last, declared the
Preludes to have been composed before he went away with Madame Sand,
and to Niecks personally he maintained that he had copied all of them.
Niecks does not credit him altogether, for there are letters in which
several of the Preludes are mentioned as being sent to Paris, so he
reaches the conclusion that "Chopin's labors at Majorca on the Preludes
were confined to selecting, filing and polishing." This seems to be a
sensible solution.
Robert Schumann wrote of these Preludes: "I must signalize them as most
remarkable. I will confess I expected something quite different,
carried out in the grand style of his studies. It is almost the
contrary here; these are sketches, the beginning of studies, or, if you
will, ruins, eagles' feathers, all strangely intermingled. But in every
piece we find in his own hand, 'Frederic Chopin wrote it.' One
recognizes him in his pauses, in his impetuous respiration. He is the
boldest, the proudest poet soul of his time. To be sure the book also
contains some morbid, feverish, repellant traits; but let everyone look
in it for something that will enchant him. Philistines, however, must
keep away."
It was in these Preludes that Ignaz Moscheles first comprehended Chopin
and his methods of execution. The German pianist had found his music
harsh and dilettantish in modulation, but Chopin's originality of
performance--"he glides lightly over the keys in a fairy-like way with
his delicate fingers"--quite reconciled the elder man to this strange
music.
To Liszt the Preludes seem modestly named, but "are not the less types
of perfection in a mode created by himself, and stamped like all his
other works with the high impress of his poetic genius. Written in the
commencement of his career, they are characterized by a youthful vigor
not to be found in some of his subsequent works, even when more
elaborate, finished and richer in combinations; a vigor which is
entirely lost in his latest productions, marked by an overexcited
sensibility, a morbid irritability, and giving painful intimations of
his own state of suffering and exhaustion."
Liszt, as usual, erred on the sentimental side. Chopin, being
essentially a man of moods, like many great men, and not necessarily
feminine in this respect, cannot always be pinned down to any
particular period. Several of the Preludes are very morbid--I purposely
use this word--as is some of his early music, while he seems quite gay
just before his death.
"The Preludes follow out no technical idea, are free creations on a
small basis, and exhibit the musician in all his versatility," says
Louis Ehlert. "No work of Chopin's portrays his inner organization so
faithfully and completely. Much is embryonic. It is as though he turned
the leaves of his fancy without completely reading any page. Still, one
finds in them the thundering power of the Scherzi, the half satirical,
half coquettish elegance of the Mazurkas, and the southern, luxuriously
fragrant breath of the Nocturnes. Often it is as though they were small
falling stars dissolved into tones as they fall."
Jean Kleczynski, who is credited with understanding Chopin, himself a
Pole and a pianist, thinks that "people have gone too far in seeking in
the Preludes for traces of that misanthropy, of that weariness of life
to which he was prey during his stay in the Island of Majorca...Very
few of the Preludes present this character of ennui, and that which is
the most marked, the second one, must have been written, according to
Count Tarnowski, a long time before he went to Majorca. ... What is
there to say concerning the other Preludes, full of good humor and
gaiety--No. 18, in E flat; No. 21, in B flat; No. 23, in F, or the
last, in D minor? Is it not strong and energetic, concluding, as it
does, with three cannon shots?"
Willeby in his "Frederic Francois Chopin" considers at length the
Preludes. He agrees in the main with Niecks, that certain of these
compositions were written at Valdemosa--Nos. 4, 6, 9, 13, 20 and
21--and that "Chopin, having sketches of others with him, completed the
whole there, and published them under one opus number. ... The
atmosphere of those I have named is morbid and azotic; to them there
clings a faint flavor of disease, a something which is overripe in its
lusciousness and febrile in its passion. This in itself inclines me to
believe they were written at the time named."
This is all very well, but Chopin was faint and febrile in his music
before he went to Majorca, and the plain facts adduced by Gutmann and
Niecks cannot be passed over. Henry James, an old admirer of Madame
Sand, admits her utter unreliability, and so we may look upon her
evidence as romantic but by no means infallible. The case now stands:
Chopin may have written a few of the Preludes at Majorca, filed them,
finished them, but the majority of them were in his portfolio in 1837
and 1838. Op. 45, a separate Prelude in C sharp minor, was published in
December, 1841. It was composed at Nohant in August of that year. It is
dedicated to Mme. la Princesse Elizabeth Czernicheff, whose name, as
Chopin confesses in a letter, he knows not how to spell.
II
Theodore Kullak is curt and pedagogic in his preface to the Preludes.
He writes:
Chopin's genius nowhere reveals itself more charmingly than
within narrowly bounded musical forms. The Preludes are, in
their aphoristic brevity, masterpieces of the first rank. Some
of them appear like briefly sketched mood pictures related to
the nocturne style, and offer no technical hindrance even to
the less advanced player. I mean Nos. 4, 6, 7, 9, 15 and 20.
More difficult are Nos. 17, 25 and 11, without, however,
demanding eminent virtuosity. The other Preludes belong to a
species of character-etude. Despite their brevity of outline
they are on a par with the great collections op. 10 and op.
25. In so far as it is practicable--special cases of
individual endowments not being taken into consideration--I
would propose the following order of succession: Begin with
Nos. 1, 14, 10, 22, 23, 3 and 18. Very great bravura is
demanded by Nos. 12, 8, 16 and 24. The difficulty of the other
Preludes, Nos. 2, 5, 13, 19 and 21, lies in the delicate piano
and legato technique, which, on account of the extended
positions, leaps and double notes, presupposes a high degree
of development.
This is eminently a common sense grouping. The first prelude, which,
like the first etude, begins in C, has all the characteristics of an
impromptu. We know the wonderful Bach Preludes, which grew out of a
free improvisation to the collection of dance forms called a suite, and
the preludes which precede his fugues. In the latter Bach sometimes
exhibits all the objectivity of the study or toccata, and often wears
his heart in full view. Chopin's Preludes--the only preludes to be
compared to Bach's--are largely personal, subjective, and intimate.
This first one is not Bach-ian, yet it could have been written by no
one but a devout Bach student. The pulsating, passionate, agitated,
feverish, hasty qualities of the piece are modern; so is the changeful
modulation. It is a beautiful composition, rising to no dramatic
heights, but questioning and full of life. Klindworth writes in triplet
groups, Kullak in quintolets. Breitkopf & Hartel do not. Dr. Hugo
Riemann, who has edited a few of the Preludes, phrases the first bars
thus:
Desperate and exasperating to the nerves is the second prelude in A
minor. It is an asymmetric tune. Chopin seldom wrote ugly music, but is
this not ugly, forlorn, despairing, almost grotesque, and discordant?
It indicates the deepest depression in its sluggish, snake-like
progression. Willeby finds a resemblance to the theme of the first
nocturne. And such a theme! The tonality is vague, beginning in E
minor. Chopin's method of thematic parallelism is here very clear. A
small figure is repeated in descending keys until hopeless gloom and
depraved melancholy are reached in the closing chords. Chopin now is
morbid, here are all his most antipathetic qualities. There is aversion
to life--in this music he is a true lycanthrope. A self-induced
hypnosis, a mental, an emotional atrophy are all present.
Kullak divides the accompaniment, difficult for small hands, between
the two. Riemann detaches the eighth notes of the bass figures, as is
his wont, for greater clearness. Like Klindworth, he accents heavily
the final chords. He marks his metronome 50 to the half note. All the
editions are lento with alla breve.
That the Preludes are a sheaf of moods, loosely held together by the
rather vague title, is demonstrated by the third, in the key of G. The
rippling, rain-like figure for the left hand is in the nature of a
study. The melody is delicate in sentiment, Gallic in its esprit. A
true salon piece, this prelude has no hint of artificiality. It is a
precise antithesis to the mood of the previous one. Graceful and gay,
the G major prelude is a fair reflex of Chopin's sensitive and
naturally buoyant nature. It requires a light hand and nimble fingers.
The melodic idea requires no special comment. Kullak phrases it
differently from Riemann and Klindworth. The latter is the preferable.
Klindworth gives 72 to the half note as his metronomic marking, Riemann
only 60--which is too slow--while Klindworth contents himself by
marking a simple Vivace. Regarding the fingering one may say that all
tastes are pleased in these three editions. Klindworth's is the
easiest. Riemann breaks up the phrase in the bass figure, but I cannot
see the gain on the musical side.
Niecks truthfully calls the fourth prelude in E minor "a little poem,
the exquisitely sweet, languid pensiveness of which defies description.
The composer seems to be absorbed in the narrow sphere of his ego, from
which the wide, noisy world is for the time shut out." Willeby finds
this prelude to be "one of the most beautiful of these spontaneous
sketches; for they are no more than sketches. The melody seems
literally to wail, and reaches its greatest pitch of intensity at the
stretto." For Karasowski it is a "real gem, and alone would immortalize
the name of Chopin as a poet." It must have been this number that
impelled Rubinstein to assert that the Preludes were the pearls of his
works. In the Klindworth edition, fifth bar from the last, the editor
has filled in the harmonies to the first six notes of the left hand,
added thirds, which is not reprehensible, although uncalled for. Kullak
makes some new dynamic markings and several enharmonic changes. He also
gives as metronome 69 to the quarter. This tiny prelude contains
wonderful music. The grave reiteration of the theme may have suggested
to Peter Cornelius his song "Ein Ton." Chopin expands a melodic unit,
and one singularly pathetic. The whole is like some canvas by
Rembrandt, Rembrandt who first dramatized the shadow in which a single
motif is powerfully handled; some sombre effect of echoing light in the
profound of a Dutch interior. For background Chopin has substituted his
soul; no one in art, except Bach or Rembrandt, could paint as Chopin
did in this composition. Its despair has the antique flavor, and there
is a breadth, nobility and proud submission quite free from the
tortured, whimpering complaint of the second prelude. The picture is
small, but the subject looms large in meanings.
The fifth prelude in D is Chopin at his happiest. Its arabesque pattern
conveys a most charming content; and there is a dewy freshness, a joy
in life, that puts to flight much of the morbid tittle-tattle about
Chopin's sickly soul. The few bars of this prelude, so seldom heard in
public, reveal musicianship of the highest order. The harmonic scheme
is intricate; Klindworth phrases the first four bars so as to bring out
the alternate B and B flat. It is Chopin spinning his finest, his most
iridescent web.
The next prelude, the sixth, in B minor, is doleful, pessimistic. As
George Sand says: "It precipitates the soul into frightful depression."
It is the most frequently played--and oh! how meaninglessly--prelude of
the set; this and the one in D flat. Classical is its repression of
feeling, its pure contour. The echo effect is skilfully managed,
monotony being artfully avoided. Klindworth rightfully slurs the duple
group of eighths; Kullak tries for the same effect by different means.
The duality of the voices should be clearly expressed. The tempo,
marked in both editions, lento assai, is fast. To be precise,
Klindworth gives 66 to the quarter.
The plaintive little mazurka of two lines, the seventh prelude, is a
mere silhouette of the national dance. Yet in its measures is
compressed all Mazovia. Klindworth makes a variant in the fourth bar
from the last, a G sharp instead of an F sharp. It is a more piquant
climax, perhaps not admissible to the Chopin purist. In the F sharp
minor prelude No. 7, Chopin gives us a taste of his grand manner. For
Niecks the piece is jerky and agitated, and doubtless suggests a mental
condition bordering on anxiety; but if frenzy there is, it is kept well
in check by the exemplary taste of the composer. The sadness is rather
elegiac, remote, and less poignant than in the E minor prelude.
Harmonic heights are reached on the second page--surely Wagner knew
these bars when he wrote "Tristan and Isolde"--while the ingenuity of
the figure and avoidance of a rhythmical monotone are evidences of
Chopin's feeling for the decorative. It is a masterly prelude.
Klindworth accents the first of the bass triplets, and makes an
unnecessary enharmonic change at the sixth and seventh lines.
There is a measure of grave content in the ninth prelude in E. It is
rather gnomic, and contains hints of both Brahms and Beethoven. It has
an ethical quality, but that may be because of its churchly rhythm and
color.
The C sharp minor prelude, No. 10, must be the "eagle wings" of
Schumann's critique. There is a flash of steel gray, deepening into
black, and then the vision vanishes as though some huge bird aloft had
plunged down through blazing sunlight, leaving a color-echo in the void
as it passed to its quarry. Or, to be less figurative, this prelude is
a study in arpeggio, with double notes interspersed, and is too short
to make more than a vivid impression.