Scherzo No.3 in C sharp minor, Op.39

Frédéric Chopin (1810-1849)

Scherzo No.3 in C sharp minor, Op.39

Chopin’s work in scherzo form was complementary and parallel to his work in ballade form. The first Ballade and the first Scherzo were both conceived in about 1831 and - after what seems like far more than a decade of development in style and temper­ament - the fourth and last of each set was completed in 1842. It is true that, whereas the ballade was something he more or less invented, the scherzo had a long history and had already developed something of the macabre element which is such a prominent feature of Chopin’s treatment of the form. Even so, the demonic character of his First Scherzo in B minor was still so unconventional that Schumann was moved by it to make his classic remark that if this is a joke he would like to know what serious music sounds like. When it first came onto the market in this country the publisher thought it expedient to ignore Chopin’s title and call it “The Infernal Banquet.”

The scherzos became gradually less infernal, however. Although, to begin with, the Third Scherzo in C sharp minor is recognisably related in temperament to the First in B minor, it later achieves a radiance not so very far from the happy mood of the Fourth in E major, which he was to write three years later. After the passionate first section in C sharp minor, in anticipation of the conventional ternary form the ear easily accepts the D flat chorale (with its quiet cascades of quavers at the end of each line) as the contrasting major-key middle section. In fact, the opening section is only briefly recalled and the chorale makes a long reappearance in E major before the final acceleration into the coda and the not obviously predictable C sharp minor ending.

Two Nocturnes, Op.62

No.1 in B major

No.2 in E major

Chopin’s last two Nocturnes, written in 1846 round about the time of the end of his relationship with George Sand, are perhaps the most beautiful of them all. In the first part of the Nocturne in B major the main theme is presented in a comparatively simple form, richly harmonised and counterpointed though it is. It is interrupted by a florid nightingale in D sharp minor and repeated. After the A flat major middle section, the main theme returns, preceded by a long trill and most voluptuously elaborated by a whole string of trills and grace notes on every melodic inflection. The ecstatic pause, following the reappearance of the main theme and before the return of the nightingale, is one of the most eloquent silences in music.

In the style and shape of its opening theme, Op.62, No.2, seems to revert to the manner of the earlier nocturnes. But after the modulations it experiences as it is developed, and after an unsettling agitato middle section, the main theme is unable to recover its original E major serenity. The agitato material is left with the responsibility of resolving the conflict with C sharp minor.

Sonata in B flat minor, Op.35

Grave - doppio movimento

Scherzo

Marche funèbre: lento

Presto

Robert Schumann has never been forgiven for finding “something repulsive” in the third movement of Chopin’s Piano Sonata in B flat minor. But he did have the perception to realize that this is no ordinary slow movement and that there is, in fact, something anomalous about it. Although he could not have known it, the Marche funèbre was written two years before the rest of the sonata as a separate work - to commemorate, so they say, the anniversary of the Warsaw rising. The other three movements were designed to fit round it: “I am composing a sonata in B flat minor which will have in it the funeral march you already know,” Chopin wrote to a friend from Nohant in 1839.

Schumann could not have known either that an orchestral arrangement of the Marche funèbre would be performed at Chopin’s funeral service in the Madeleine in October 1849, that it would be issued as a memorial by three of his publishers a month later and that from then on it would be more closely associated with funerals than is Mendelssohn’s Hochzeitsmarsch with weddings. There is something repulsive about that, as there is in the subsequent tradition of presenting the movement as though it were a passing funeral cortège. It is a sure indication of the high quality of the sonata in general that it has survived such treatment of its central feature.

One reason why it has survived is that the Marche funèbre is so thoroughly and so carefully integrated with the other three movements that, when the sonata is performed complete, it relates more to its context than to its extraneous associations. The falling seventh in the first of the four Grave bars at the beginning of the work is not only an appropriately grim opening gesture but also the thematic cell from which much of the subsequent melodic material is derived. The agitated first subject not only relates to the falling seventh but also anticipates the tragedy implicit in the funeral march that comes later. Chopin is not prepared to shut out the light at this stage, however, and it is not the first subject - he omits it from the recapitulation - but the more lyrical second subject which assumes the greater importance in the construction, bringing about the B flat major ending of the movement.

This same lyrical inspiration illuminates the G flat major trio section of the second movement. But this time the demons which persecute the E flat minor first section return in full-scale vehemence and, although the trio section is briefly recalled, the ending in the relative major is distinctly uneasy. Schumann felt that, after this “bold, intelligent and imaginative” second movement, “an adagio in D flat, say, would have had an immeasurably more beautiful effect” than the “still more sombre funeral march” which actually does follow - and which, of course, is unquestionably appropriate in a context so thoughtfully prepared to accommodate both its ceremonial B flat minor outer sections and its consolatory but still sorrowful middle section in D flat major.

There is no consolation of any kind in the ghostly flight of bare octave triplets which, exclusively, haunt the Presto last movement. Schumann said it is “more mockery than music.” Mendelssohn couldn’t understand it at all. For Chopin, who simply described it as “a short finale of about three pages…the left hand chattering unisono with the right hand,” there was apparently nothing very special about this extraordinary adventure in dry textures, sotto voce dynamics and fugitive harmonies.

Three Waltzes, Op.64

No.1 in D flat major

No.2 in C sharp minor

No.3 in A flat major

However regrettable the “Minute Waltz” nickname attached to Op.64, No.1, it is surely preferable to “Valse du petit chien” which is sometimes applied in France in the belief that Chopin was inspired by the sight of a little dog chasing its tale. Whatever the truth of that notion, “Minute Waltz” is appropriate at least in that the Waltz in D flat major is a very short piece. The other two in the set are not much longer. Written and published in 1847, they represent a kind of purification of the form with a clearly defined ternary structure and an evident thematic economy. The charmingly poignant C sharp minor Waltz - a not too distant relation of the mazurkas in the same key - has only three main themes, the expressive syncopations in the D flat major middle section offering a valuable relief from metric regularity. As for the A flat major, the last of Chopin’s published waltzes, it is the most subtle construction of all. The first section is economically based on one theme and several variants in eight-bar periods, the last of which presents in the left hand an anticipation of the theme of the C major middle section.

Berceuse in D flat major, Op.57

The Berceuse is one of the miracles of Chopin’s late years. All it is, basically, is a four-bar melody and a one-bar accompaniment figure. The left-hand repeats the accompaniment (a tonic chord and a dominant seventh) more than thirty times until - while the rocking cradle-song rhythm remains always the same - the harmonies briefly veer towards the subdominant on the last page. The magical quality is in the variety of decorative inspirations applied to the melodic line in the right hand, which scarcely seems to be aware of what the left hand is doing, its chromatic colouring clashing most exquisitely with the explicit D flat major harmonies in the bass. Dedicated to a former pupil - “à Mlle. Elise Gavard, son vieux professeur et ami, F.F. Chopin” - the Berceuse was completed in 1844 when, it seems, the two bars of left-hand introduction were added to the original version dating from the previous year.

Twelve Studies, Op.10

No.1 in C major, No.2 in A minor,No.3 in E major, No.4 in C sharp minor, No.5 in G flat major, No.6 in E flat minor, No.7 in C major, No.8 in F major, No.9 in F minor, No.10 in A flat major, No.11 in E flat major, No.12 in C minor

As a connoisseur of keyboard studies, Schumann was quick to see the very special virtues of Chopin’s Op.10 when the twelve Grandes Etudes first appeared in 1833. Inspired in the first place by a Paganini performance - in Warsaw in 1829 - and much influenced by the keyboard style of J.S.Bach, they corresponded closely with what Schumann was looking for among the mechanical compilations of his contemporaries. Liszt, to whom Chopin dedicated this first set of studies, admired them too, flattered them most sincerely in his own Etudes and uttered the basic truth about them when he said that “they spring, like all his works, from the nature of his poetic genius.”

There is nothing mechanical or merely muscular in a Chopin study, however useful an exercise it might be. The right hand part of the first Study in C major consists exclusively of broken chords which not only exercise the fingers but which also pour cascades of interesting harmonies on the melody in the left hand below. The A minor Study is an exercise in finger-crossing for the right hand - with a witty parody in the left. Many of the Op.10 studies have, in fact, appealed to the popular imagination as successfully as any other category of Chopin’s work. No.3 in E major is such a well prepared exercise in legato expression that, at half Chopin’s tempo, it has been adopted as pop tune. No.4 in C sharp minor, a study in what used to be known as velocity, has earned itself the nickname of “The Torrent” and every one knows the “Black Keys” Study in G flat major.

Study No.6 in E flat minor has achieved less familiarity but is a remarkably beautiful exercise in polyphony with a middle voice undulating in semi-quavers between melodic lines in treble and bass. That kind of writing is scarcely baroque counterpoint, of course, but there is more than a hint of the pre-classical toccata in the delightful seventh Study in C major. The eighth in F major is perhaps the most brilliant in the set, calling for a flexible left hand which retains its good humour in spite of all the difficulties experienced by the right. In the ninth in F minor the roles are reversed, the left hand sustaining an unbroken accompaniment of the smoothest legato arpeggios while the right picks out the semi-staccato melody set against it.

The technical problem of the tenth in A flat major, which is the contradictory rhythmic accents of right hand and left, creates its own physical exhilaration. Perhaps it was this one which moved Rellstab to make his famous remark that any one who attempts these studies should have a surgeon at hand. Or perhaps he feared that the spread chords of the eleventh in E flat would dislocate his fingers (although the secret of playing them is in the wrist). But even Rellstab, who was poet enough to invent the “Moonlight” title for Beethoven’s Piano Sonata in C sharp minor would have recognised the passionately “revolutionary” quality of the last piece in the set - a study so emotional that it gave rise to, or at least sustained, the idea that it was inspired by the fall of Warsaw to the Russian army in 1831.

Gerald Larner©