Variations in B flat major Op.83a (1841–44)

The Variations in B flat were conceived not for piano duet but for piano solo: they were intended as a companion pieces to the Variations in D minor and the Variations in E flat written at much the same time in 1841. Although only the D minor work carries a descriptive title – it was published as Variations sérieuses Op.54 soon after it was written – we know from a letter to his sister Rebecka that Mendelssohn thought of the E flat set as “Variations sentimentales” and the B flat set as “Variations gracieuses.” They were not published in the composer’s lifetime, however, and were issued simply as Variations in E flat Op.82 and Variations in B flat Op.83 in 1850.

It was for his other sister, Fanny Hensel, that Mendelssohn arranged the Variations in B flat as a piano duet, the first performance of which they gave together at one of her celebrated musical evenings in Berlin in 1844. Although, inevitably, the Variations have more textural density in duet form, they are scarcely less “graceful” for that. The theme itself, marked Andante tranquillo, is presented as a fairly serious chorale in B flat, but the treble figuration dancing round the theme in the Cantabile first variation is certainly not lacking in gracefulness. Nor is the contrapuntal elegance of the of the second. One would probably not apply the same description to the joyfully march-like third, still less the funereal fourth in D minor with its drum rolls low in the bass. After the contemplative fifth variation has poetically reverted to B flat major, however, grace is definitively restored with the sixth variation (Allegro assai vivace) where it is sustained, even under the pressure of cadenza and coda duties, to the end.