Program Notes
Peter Miyamoto MU School of Music Recital
Program Notes - September 10, 2021
Beethoven Sonata No. 26 in E-flat Major, Op. 81a “Les Adieux”
Ludwig van Beethoven’s Sonata in E-flat Major, Op.81a was written in 1809-1810 in response to the departure and nine-month absence of his great friend and benefactor, Archduke Rudolph. The Archduke fled Vienna in May 1809 as Napoleon Bonaparte, once Beethoven’s idol, advanced on the city. The work is unique among Beethoven’s sonatas in that its three movements are titled, lending the work programmatic overtones. Although the publisher used French titles Les Adieux, L’Absence and Le Retour (the Farewell, the Absence and the Return), Beethoven preferred the German Das Lebewohl, Abwesenheit, and Das Wiedersehen, writing to the publisher, “Lebewohl is something quite different from Les Adieux, the first one says to one from the heart, the other to an entire assembly, to entire cities.”
The first movement opens with a slow introduction that presents the movement’s motto, a falling, three-note horn call over which Beethoven wrote the syllables “Le-be-wohl.” An anguished A-flat major chord propels the movement into an emotionally charged Allegro, constantly driven forward by eighth-note accompaniment figures that evoke the churning of Archduke Rudolph’s carriage wheels. The motto figures prominently throughout, acting as the sonata’s second subject, and traveling through numerous foreign tonalities in the development section. The movement’s extended coda features the motto set against scalar, eighth-note passages representing Archduke’s carriage as it recedes further into the distance.
The slow movement poignantly captures at various turns Beethoven’s sadness, nostalgia and anguish at his friend’s absence. Like Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto, Op. 73, the movement transitions without pause into the final movement, exploding into the finale with a joyous virtuoso passage on the dominant. This sonata-form movement, marked vivacissimamente (as lively as possible), features a development section exclusively in a piano dynamic and a coda that portrays the long-awaited reunion of Beethoven and the Archduke.
Chopin Ballade No. 4 in F Minor, Op. 52
Each of Frederic Chopin’s four ballades is related to sonata form in that it contains development areas and two themes that are eventually recapitulated. But it is through tonal and formal deviations from the archetypal classical form that Chopin creates a synthesis of traditional form and a new, romantic aesthetic (in form and content) that results in unified structures imbued with powerful, epic poetry. In each ballade, Chopin undermines the classical aesthetic of departure and return, creating end-weighted structures that, consistent with the romantic aesthetic, delay the attainment of an emotional climax for as long as possible. The Fourth Ballade, in particular, unites sonata form with the technique of variation.
Chopin’s ballades have been associated with poems by Chopin’s compatriot in exile, Adam Mickiewicz (1798-1855), though these links are far from universally accepted. The story connected with the F Minor Ballade is Mickiewicz’s poem “Switezianka,” a retelling of the Ondine legend. A young hunter encounters a water nymph who appears at night along the shores of Lake Switez and disappears at dawn. He immediately falls in love, but she is reluctant to trust him- she knows all too well the treachery that lurks in the hearts of men! Her heart is heavy. She has fallen in love with him, but cannot trust her heart, and gravitates between hope and despair over her situation. Finally, she decides to test him. One night, she appears to him in the guise of another, more beautiful woman, and invites him to engage in love. They begin to exchange caresses, when suddenly she reveals her true self. She curses his infidelity and causes a tremendous storm to arise. The waters of the lake open up into an abyss, and both are engulfed into its depths.
Ravel Jeux d’eau (Play of the Water)
The pianistic writing in this landmark of Impressionism owes much to Franz Liszt as does its title – an obvious hommage to Liszt’s Jeux d’eau à la villa d’Este (1883). Composed in 1901, Maurice Ravel said of his work:
Jeux d’eau is at the origin of whatever pianistic innovations my works may be thought to contain. This piece, inspired by the noise of water and the musical sounds emitted by fountains, waterfalls and streams, is based on two themes, on the model of sonata first movement, but without conforming to the classical plan of key relations.
The score bears a quotation at its opening from Symbolist poet Henri de Régnier’s Fête d’eau: “Dieu fluvial riant de l’eau qui le chatouille” (A river-god laughing as the water which tickles him). The blend of pentatonicism, bitonality (one section mixing C Major and F# Major foreshadows Stravinsky’s famous Petrushka chord), impressionism and Lisztian virtuosity in Jeux d’eau make it a masterpiece of the Impressionistic Movement.
Rachmaninoff Moment Musicaux in E Minor, Op. 16, No. 4
Sergei Rachmaninoff wrote his set of six Moment Musicaux in 1896. As the name suggests, each piece in the set is intended to encapsulate a musical moment or emotional state. The set as a whole displays great diversity, containing what are essentially lyrical nocturnes, song without words, a barcarolle, an elegy and a set of theme and variations. The Moment Musicaux No. 4 in E Minor is a turbulent, virtuosic etude featuring a churning, ever-present, agitated accompaniment. An apocalyptic mood is set as the thematic material returns in ever building cries of anguish.
Schumann Carnaval Op. 9
To enter the world of Carnaval is to enter the complex world of Robert Schumann’s psyche. Full of references to 19th Century musical and literary figures, musical depictions of Schumann’s close circle of friends, as well as caricatures of Italian Commedia dell’Arte characters, Carnaval perhaps more than any of Schumann’s other works is a musical encyclopedia of Schumann’s creative mind.
Finished at carnival time in 1835, Carnaval is unified by the two musical motives A(or Ab)-Eb-C-B, and Ab-C-B which occur throughout this piece. Written non-musically, these notes spell Asch, the name of the birthplace of Ernestine von Fricken, then the object of Schumann’s attentions, and also the only letters in Schumann’s name that can be played musically (SCHumAnn).
Carnaval begins with a Préambule marked, perhaps with tongue-in cheek, “Quasi maestoso,” or “as if majestically.” This movement serves as an introduction announcing the coming of the carnival, and is followed by two portraits of Commedia dell’Arte clowns Pierrot and Arlequin, Pierrot being the sad-sack clown perpetually shooed away by others, and Arlequin being the jester clown.
Following the Valse Noble (noble waltz), Schumann paints portraits of what he perceived as the dual aspects of his personality, the dreamy Eusebius and the somewhat more impetuous Florestan. Next to appear on the carnival stage is Coquette, the flirtatious dancer fluttering her fans provocatively, then shutting them with a stamp. After Réplique comes the lively Papillons. Papillons is also the name of Schumann’s earlier set of 12 pieces representing a masked ball, a piece that is quoted in the Florestan movement and the concluding movement of Carnaval. In the next piece, ASCH-SCHA, the motif comes to the fore, seemingly dancing in different voices.
The next pieces are portraits of three important personalities in Schumann’s life. The first, Chiarina, is a fiery portrait of Clara Wieck, later Schumann’s wife, whose performance of Carnaval prompted Liszt to the opinion that it was one of the greatest works he knew. The next describes the composer Chopin, who Schumann praised highly. The last, Estrella, is a portrait of Ernestine von Fricken, then a piano student of Schumann’s future father-in-law, Friedrich Wieck.
Following these portraits are the final representations of scenes from Commedia dell’Arte. Reconnaissance describes a lovers’ tryst, while Pantalone and Colombine caricatures the Venetian merchant Pantalone, and his wife Colombine, who together form the Italian equivalent of Punch and Judy. A tribute to the legendary violinist Paganini is then surrounded by the Valse Allemande. Paganini, of course, had an enormous influence on not just the violinists of the time, but also pianist/composers such as Liszt, Chopin and Schumann.
Schumann described the next piece, Aveu (marked “passionato”) as a “confession of love,” and the next piece, Promenade, as a “walk through the ballroom with one’s partner.” Pause, which is an excerpt from the Préambule, leads into the final piece, Marche des Davidsbündler contre les Philistines. The Davidsbund, or League of David, was an imaginary organization created by Schumann to fight the Philistine attitude of complacently accepting the status quo. Schumann took a very real part in this crusade, using his newspaper, the Neue Zeitschrit für Musik, as a forum to attack superficial art, signing the articles with imaginary names of members of the Davidsbund such as Eusebius and Florestan. Beginning as a pompous march in three (again with tongue-in-cheek), the final piece of Carnaval has all the feel of a huge curtain call as it builds to its appropriately brilliant ending.
Program Notes by Peter Miyamoto
Copyright 2021
Beethoven Sonata No. 26 in E-flat Major, Op. 81a “Les Adieux”
Ludwig van Beethoven’s Sonata in E-flat Major, Op.81a was written in 1809-1810 in response to the departure and nine-month absence of his great friend and benefactor, Archduke Rudolph. The Archduke fled Vienna in May 1809 as Napoleon Bonaparte, once Beethoven’s idol, advanced on the city. The work is unique among Beethoven’s sonatas in that its three movements are titled, lending the work programmatic overtones. Although the publisher used French titles Les Adieux, L’Absence and Le Retour (the Farewell, the Absence and the Return), Beethoven preferred the German Das Lebewohl, Abwesenheit, and Das Wiedersehen, writing to the publisher, “Lebewohl is something quite different from Les Adieux, the first one says to one from the heart, the other to an entire assembly, to entire cities.”
The first movement opens with a slow introduction that presents the movement’s motto, a falling, three-note horn call over which Beethoven wrote the syllables “Le-be-wohl.” An anguished A-flat major chord propels the movement into an emotionally charged Allegro, constantly driven forward by eighth-note accompaniment figures that evoke the churning of Archduke Rudolph’s carriage wheels. The motto figures prominently throughout, acting as the sonata’s second subject, and traveling through numerous foreign tonalities in the development section. The movement’s extended coda features the motto set against scalar, eighth-note passages representing Archduke’s carriage as it recedes further into the distance.
The slow movement poignantly captures at various turns Beethoven’s sadness, nostalgia and anguish at his friend’s absence. Like Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto, Op. 73, the movement transitions without pause into the final movement, exploding into the finale with a joyous virtuoso passage on the dominant. This sonata-form movement, marked vivacissimamente (as lively as possible), features a development section exclusively in a piano dynamic and a coda that portrays the long-awaited reunion of Beethoven and the Archduke.
Chopin Ballade No. 4 in F Minor, Op. 52
Each of Frederic Chopin’s four ballades is related to sonata form in that it contains development areas and two themes that are eventually recapitulated. But it is through tonal and formal deviations from the archetypal classical form that Chopin creates a synthesis of traditional form and a new, romantic aesthetic (in form and content) that results in unified structures imbued with powerful, epic poetry. In each ballade, Chopin undermines the classical aesthetic of departure and return, creating end-weighted structures that, consistent with the romantic aesthetic, delay the attainment of an emotional climax for as long as possible. The Fourth Ballade, in particular, unites sonata form with the technique of variation.
Chopin’s ballades have been associated with poems by Chopin’s compatriot in exile, Adam Mickiewicz (1798-1855), though these links are far from universally accepted. The story connected with the F Minor Ballade is Mickiewicz’s poem “Switezianka,” a retelling of the Ondine legend. A young hunter encounters a water nymph who appears at night along the shores of Lake Switez and disappears at dawn. He immediately falls in love, but she is reluctant to trust him- she knows all too well the treachery that lurks in the hearts of men! Her heart is heavy. She has fallen in love with him, but cannot trust her heart, and gravitates between hope and despair over her situation. Finally, she decides to test him. One night, she appears to him in the guise of another, more beautiful woman, and invites him to engage in love. They begin to exchange caresses, when suddenly she reveals her true self. She curses his infidelity and causes a tremendous storm to arise. The waters of the lake open up into an abyss, and both are engulfed into its depths.
Ravel Jeux d’eau (Play of the Water)
The pianistic writing in this landmark of Impressionism owes much to Franz Liszt as does its title – an obvious hommage to Liszt’s Jeux d’eau à la villa d’Este (1883). Composed in 1901, Maurice Ravel said of his work:
Jeux d’eau is at the origin of whatever pianistic innovations my works may be thought to contain. This piece, inspired by the noise of water and the musical sounds emitted by fountains, waterfalls and streams, is based on two themes, on the model of sonata first movement, but without conforming to the classical plan of key relations.
The score bears a quotation at its opening from Symbolist poet Henri de Régnier’s Fête d’eau: “Dieu fluvial riant de l’eau qui le chatouille” (A river-god laughing as the water which tickles him). The blend of pentatonicism, bitonality (one section mixing C Major and F# Major foreshadows Stravinsky’s famous Petrushka chord), impressionism and Lisztian virtuosity in Jeux d’eau make it a masterpiece of the Impressionistic Movement.
Rachmaninoff Moment Musicaux in E Minor, Op. 16, No. 4
Sergei Rachmaninoff wrote his set of six Moment Musicaux in 1896. As the name suggests, each piece in the set is intended to encapsulate a musical moment or emotional state. The set as a whole displays great diversity, containing what are essentially lyrical nocturnes, song without words, a barcarolle, an elegy and a set of theme and variations. The Moment Musicaux No. 4 in E Minor is a turbulent, virtuosic etude featuring a churning, ever-present, agitated accompaniment. An apocalyptic mood is set as the thematic material returns in ever building cries of anguish.
Schumann Carnaval Op. 9
To enter the world of Carnaval is to enter the complex world of Robert Schumann’s psyche. Full of references to 19th Century musical and literary figures, musical depictions of Schumann’s close circle of friends, as well as caricatures of Italian Commedia dell’Arte characters, Carnaval perhaps more than any of Schumann’s other works is a musical encyclopedia of Schumann’s creative mind.
Finished at carnival time in 1835, Carnaval is unified by the two musical motives A(or Ab)-Eb-C-B, and Ab-C-B which occur throughout this piece. Written non-musically, these notes spell Asch, the name of the birthplace of Ernestine von Fricken, then the object of Schumann’s attentions, and also the only letters in Schumann’s name that can be played musically (SCHumAnn).
Carnaval begins with a Préambule marked, perhaps with tongue-in cheek, “Quasi maestoso,” or “as if majestically.” This movement serves as an introduction announcing the coming of the carnival, and is followed by two portraits of Commedia dell’Arte clowns Pierrot and Arlequin, Pierrot being the sad-sack clown perpetually shooed away by others, and Arlequin being the jester clown.
Following the Valse Noble (noble waltz), Schumann paints portraits of what he perceived as the dual aspects of his personality, the dreamy Eusebius and the somewhat more impetuous Florestan. Next to appear on the carnival stage is Coquette, the flirtatious dancer fluttering her fans provocatively, then shutting them with a stamp. After Réplique comes the lively Papillons. Papillons is also the name of Schumann’s earlier set of 12 pieces representing a masked ball, a piece that is quoted in the Florestan movement and the concluding movement of Carnaval. In the next piece, ASCH-SCHA, the motif comes to the fore, seemingly dancing in different voices.
The next pieces are portraits of three important personalities in Schumann’s life. The first, Chiarina, is a fiery portrait of Clara Wieck, later Schumann’s wife, whose performance of Carnaval prompted Liszt to the opinion that it was one of the greatest works he knew. The next describes the composer Chopin, who Schumann praised highly. The last, Estrella, is a portrait of Ernestine von Fricken, then a piano student of Schumann’s future father-in-law, Friedrich Wieck.
Following these portraits are the final representations of scenes from Commedia dell’Arte. Reconnaissance describes a lovers’ tryst, while Pantalone and Colombine caricatures the Venetian merchant Pantalone, and his wife Colombine, who together form the Italian equivalent of Punch and Judy. A tribute to the legendary violinist Paganini is then surrounded by the Valse Allemande. Paganini, of course, had an enormous influence on not just the violinists of the time, but also pianist/composers such as Liszt, Chopin and Schumann.
Schumann described the next piece, Aveu (marked “passionato”) as a “confession of love,” and the next piece, Promenade, as a “walk through the ballroom with one’s partner.” Pause, which is an excerpt from the Préambule, leads into the final piece, Marche des Davidsbündler contre les Philistines. The Davidsbund, or League of David, was an imaginary organization created by Schumann to fight the Philistine attitude of complacently accepting the status quo. Schumann took a very real part in this crusade, using his newspaper, the Neue Zeitschrit für Musik, as a forum to attack superficial art, signing the articles with imaginary names of members of the Davidsbund such as Eusebius and Florestan. Beginning as a pompous march in three (again with tongue-in-cheek), the final piece of Carnaval has all the feel of a huge curtain call as it builds to its appropriately brilliant ending.
Program Notes by Peter Miyamoto
Copyright 2021