Victor Chestopal, piano

Transcription

1 DocMus-yksikkö Victor Chestopal, piano keskiviikkona klo Sibelius-Akatemian konserttisalissa Wednesday, May 6, pm the Sibelius Academy Concert Hall

2 Edvard Hagerup Grieg ( ): Lyriske Stykker (Lyric Pieces) Arietta op. 12 No. 1 Folkevise (Popular melody) op. 38 No. 2 Sommerfugl (Butterfly) op. 43 No. 1 Erotik (Erotikon) op. 43 No. 5 Valse-Impromptu op. 47 No. 1 Troldtog (March of the trolls) op. 54 No. 3 Notturno op. 54 No. 4 Scherzo op. 54 No. 5 Svundne Dage (Vanished days) op. 57 No. 1 Bækken (Brooklet) op. 62 No. 4 Bryllupsdag på Troldhaugen (Wedding-day at Troldhaugen) op. 65 No. 6 For dine Födder (At your feet) op. 68 No. 3 Småtrold (Puck) op. 71 No. 3 Forbi (Gone) op. 71 No. 6 Efterklang (Remembrances) op. 71 No. 7 * * * Ludwig van Beethoven ( ): Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat major, op. 106 Große Sonate für das Hammerklavier Allegro Scherzo: Assai vivace Adagio appassionato e con molto sentimento Introduzione: Largo Fuga: Allegro risoluto

3 Victor Chestopal's DocMus recital IV Edvard Hagerup Grieg ( ) Lyriske Stykker (Lyric Pieces) Edvard Grieg When at the beginning of 1990s I studied at the Accademia Pianistica Internazionale Incontri col Maestro in the charming Italian town of Imola, there was a fellow student, pianist a young lady from Norway. Once, while waiting for the lectures, we sat at the little café amid fabulous Renaissance architecture and spoke of Norway. After Bjørnson, Ibsen and Hamsun (whose novels Sult (Hunger), Pan and Victoria I have just devoured at that time), the conversation naturally turned to Grieg and we began recalling the Lyric Pieces, singing to each other their melodies one after another. United by our mutual love to these little jewels, we could not quit, and sang and sang with such enthusiasm and fervency that people around us looked with astonishment and probably thought we have escaped from the nearby famed psychiatric clinic... Both of us, teenagers as we were, had a lifelong passion for Grieg. Not only had my Norwegian vis-a-vis her great compatriot's music in her blood, but also I could recall many memorable moments of my life, associated with Grieg. I saw myself as a six-years boy, playing Halling (from op. 38) and Elves' dance (God Almighty! That was not easy: due to my rudimentary technical skills the Elves' dance rather sounded like a hippopotamus dance...). Playing four-hand transcriptions of Peer Gynt and Sigurd Jorsalfar also emerged in my memory. Then I saw myself at the age of nine holding my breath before stepping on the stage of the Small Hall of the Moscow

4 Conservatoire that evening's performance of the Poetiske Tonebilder was one of my first concert experiences. A few years later Grieg's A minor Cello Sonata became one of the first chamber music works I performed in concert (surprisingly, the composer himself undervalued this wonderfully poetic sonata, the performance of which, with Pablo Casals in Amsterdam in 1906, was one of Grieg's last concert appearances). Involuntarily I have started this little essay with the autobiographical intermezzo-rückblick. Perhaps, it is the nature of the Lyric Pieces, which inspired me to do so, for this is not merely a collection of exquisite small poems (issued in 10 volumes: op. 12, 38, 43 etc.), but a mirror, reflecting a human life saga. Grieg published Lyric pieces' first volume at the age of 24 (in 1867) and completed the last, 66 th piece six years before his death. What a wealth of emotions, characters and events life is intertwined with fantasy and fairytale (a slightly modified title of Goethe's autobiography Aus einem Leben: Dichtung und Wahrheit would suit, as it seems to me, as a subheading to the Lyric Pieces): the trolls, elves and a puck happily coexist with the shepherd's boy and a grandmother, who dances a minuet in a most graceful manner. And, naturally, let us not forget Norwegian landscapes, folk melodies and dances! The Lyric pieces are numerous, which means that for a single recital (or a half of a recital) a pianist should make a selection (only 15 pieces performed today take about 50 minutes). Choosing from among the pieces is a painful process so pity it feels too leave out many chefs-d'œuvre. It is crucially important to draw our attention to the fact that the first and the last pieces (Arietta and Remembrances) not only share E flat major tonality, but are also based upon the same motive 1. This interconnection transposes the Lyric Pieces into an even more profound, philosophical dimension: Arietta and Remembrances form an arch, a kind of rainbow, which links life's dawn and sunset. Arietta's last G vibrates in the air like a symbol of hope. The concluding G of the Remembrances is alike farewell, but a farewell beaming with soft inner light. (This can be referred to the phenomenon of Grieg's music as a whole it exerts a psychologically (if not physically!) healing effect. I remember that during a hard period of my life, when due to overworking I had to stop public performances for more than two years, I often listened to the second movement of Grieg's A minor Piano Concerto, and each time literally felt a shot of moral energy.) Examining Schumann's Symphonic Etudes and Brahms' Piano Sonata No. 3 in the program text of my previous DocMus recital (in October 2008), I have emphasized the orchestral nature of these works. Though Grieg was a connoisseur of orchestra, his piano works do not reveal such apparent orchestral features 2. (Nevertheless, it is interesting to listen to Grieg's 1 Another brilliant example of such motivic interdependence can be found from the manuscript version of Tchaikovsky's Children's Album (recorded for Melodiya by Mikhail Pletnev in 1987). The first and the last pieces of the cycle Morning Prayer and The Organ-Grinder Sings share the same motive and tonality (G major). 2 Evidently, pianist's orchestral thinking, with no reference to the repertoire, can only add value to the performance.

5 orchestral versions of several Lyric Pieces.) Grieg's piano texture derives from those of Schumann and Mendelssohn; yet, it is individual: economic (even in the A minor Piano Concerto the virtuosity is never used for the sake of superficial effects) and refined, especially with regard to the sound colors (in this respect Debussy can be considered as Grieg's direct descendant ). Grieg was a masterful pianist (at the Leipzig Conservatoire he studied with Ignaz Moscheles) with a wealth of concert experience. Despite his weak health, he continued to concertize, though he had to stop performing his Piano Concerto, as it demanded too much physical energy. You are absolutely right to be amazed that I am still giving concerts, wrote Grieg to the German pianist and composer Oscar Meyer in 1906, but the fact is that people beguile me into it and I, unfortunately, am not sufficiently principal to decline. To perform in public is the most frightening thing I know. And yet, to hear my works brought to life in a wonderful performance in accordance with my intentions that I cannot resist. 3 At the outset of the XXth century Grieg's music enjoyed tremendous popularity (the Lyric Pieces contributed greatly to this fame) and the Gramophone and Typewriter Company, not without thinking of a commercial success, produced nine phonograph recordings of Grieg's playing 4. Grieg also made Welte-Mignon recordings, but, as we all know, Welte-Mignon's technology offers a very approximate and, in most cases, gravely deformed reflection of pianist's performance. Moreover, according to the cover text of the CD Grieg and his circle play Grieg 5, a certain (private?) collection in Copenhagen contains a group of cylinders on which Grieg accompanies his wife Nina in his songs. If these recordings still remain unpublished, this is almost a crime! After tuberculosis in 1860, Grieg constantly suffered from pulmonary disorders (due to a collapsed lung), and at the year of his 60 th jubilee Grieg's health was quite poor. Nevertheless, the recording session for the Gramophone and Typewriter Company took place in the spring of 1903 in Paris. Grieg recorded the following of his compositions: Humoresque op. 6 No. 2; Alla Menuetto and Finale from the Piano Sonata op. 7; Bridal Procession op. 19 No. 2; Butterfly op. 43 No. 1; To Spring op. 43 No. 6; Gangar op. 54 No. 2; Wedding-day at Troldhaugen op. 65 No. 6; Remembrances op. 71 No. 7. Listening to Grieg's recordings is a unique experience, a real travel in time. Grieg's playing subtle, free and highly personal makes me realize once again, with poignancy, how drastically poorer our aesthetic perceptions are, compared to those of our great grandfathers' generations. One may argue that Grieg's case is unique, for he was a genius. Absolutely yes, but, I believe, the old recordings (with all their shortcomings), made by the musicians of lesser talents than Grieg's, also very often reveal a strikingly individual approach to 3 Edvard Grieg. Letters to Colleagues and Friends. Peer Gynt Press/Columbus Grieg's recordings were reissued on CD: Edvard Grieg's piano music in historical recordings. SIMAX PSI Pavilion Records Ltd. GEMM CD 9933

6 music. (Though I was a child at the time of Vladimir Horowitz's historic farewell visit to Moscow in 1986, I remember the enormous emotional effect he produced! At the end of the XXth century it was an example of a music making, comparable to Grieg's.) Among the other historical great interpretations of the Lyric Pieces I should mention the recordings of Rachmaninoff (Waltz and Elves' dance from op. 12) and Benedetti-Michelangeli (Erotikon, op. 43 No. 5, Melancholy op. 47 No. 5, Cradle song op. 68 No. 5) 6. Naturally, it is perfectly possible to perform the Lyric Pieces either as separate volumes, or as individual miniatures; however, personally, I find it difficult to resist the temptation to build up a cycle, the Alpha and Omega of which (Arietta and Remembrances) were suggested by the composer himself. (So did Sviatoslav Richter, whose unforgettable performance of the Lyric Pieces in Finlandia Hall in August 1993 I was fortunate to attend. Likewise, Emil Gilels' has chosen Arietta Remembrances frame for his selection of twenty Lyric Pieces, recorded in ) This idea is especially captivating, as there are countless possibilities to group the pieces inside this framework. As I wished to trace Grieg's creative evolution (what a distance there is, for instance, between the harmonic language of the Popular melody op. 38 No. 2 (1883) and the Gone op. 71 No. 6 (1901)!), in my selection I respect opuses' chronological order. The first half of the selection, as I perceive it, reflects the first half of human life: the versatility and swift alternation of moods and desires dominate. Since I am inclined to think that the placement of the Vanished days (op. 57 No. 1) almost at the midpoint of the Lyric Pieces is not coincidental, I have placed this piece in the center of my selection. Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita (quoting La Divina Commedia) we look backwards... Yet, life continues: the cold streams of the Brooklet are alike rebirth: En värld af svart och hvitt, en skog, en vinterdag, och långt I skogens djup en öppen källa den blänker svart och djupens ådror kvälla I den med friska pulsars kalla, fasta slag. Den fryser ej, den trotsar köldens lag. Invid dess rand jag brukade mig ställa att se hur starka lifvets krafter svälla, när världen fryser bort med bleka drag. (Bertel Gripenberg 8 ) 6 Rachmaninoff's and Benedetti-Michelangeli's recordings are included in the collection mentioned in the footnote No Deutsche Grammophone CD Excerpt from the sonnet Källan (Source). Bertel Gripenberg. Svarta Sonetter. Helsingfors: Holger Schildts förlag, 1918

7 The real-life scenes Wedding-day at Troldhaugen (Grieg's present to his wife Nina on their wedding-day) and At your feet are followed by the appearance of a little puck, who, like a ghost, runs hastily trough a dusky forest, disappears behind the trees and leaves the hero alone, immersed in his memories, evoking gone times and dear images. The penultimate piece Gone bears the heading In Memoriam. Remembrances' initial G under the fermata is the uncertainty personified. What is going to grow out of this solitary quarter note? The beginning of the following measure resolves this tiny enigma: it is a waltz remote, vague. The unexpected modulation from E flat major to D major only increases this vagueness. The hero tries to revitalize his memory: was it really so? Or maybe so? Or maybe it has not happened at all... What difference does it make now the sunset is near. En ensam man i evig tystnad drömmer. Är han väl jag? Jag vet det ej, jag glömmer det namn, det jag, den själ mig slumpen gifvit. (Bertel Gripenberg 9 ) 9 Excerpt from the sonnet Nytt lif (New life), III. Regarding the edition see the footnote No. 8.

8 Ludwig van Beethoven ( ): Piano Sonata No. 29 in B flat major, op. 106 Große Sonate für das Hammerklavier Beethoven with the score of the Missa Solemnis Almost 24 years ago, on 11 September 1985, Emil Gilels played at the Helsinki University. The program of the recital included the sonatas of Scarlatti, Debussy's Pour le piano, and Beethoven's Sonata Opus 106, commonly known as the Hammerklavier 10. That was Gilels' last recital. I thought it is worth mentioning this fact, not only as a historic event of Helsinki music life, but also because late Gilels' interpretation of the Hammerklavier (recorded by Deutsche Grammophone in ) is among the most profound renderings of this Sonata (the third movement is particularly impressive). I opened the score of the Sonata No. 29 very many times. told Gilels not long before his death 12. I played the first page of the first movement and thought: My God, what is next? No, one cannot embrace it. And at that point I told myself: If I will not learn this Sonata, as a musician I will not do something very important in life.... I have forced myself to learn it. And when I have grasped the music to the full extent, it felt like being in the Pamirs one pick opened up, then the other The association of the title Hammerklavier (pianoforte) with the Opus 106 solely is illogical, since the previous Sonata Opus 101 was likewise published für das Hammerklavier. 11 Deutsche Grammophone 28. MG Lev Barenboim. Emil Gilels. Moscow: Sovetskiy Kompozitor, 1990

9 The Hammerklavier is an unique piano work, colossal in proportions, depth, compositional and technical complexity. Its aesthetic richness and heterogeneousness is striking (though not unprecedented in Beethoven's late output); the world of the Opus 106 (for it is a world in se) comprises celestial beauty with the force that is on the verge of violence: a kind of combination of Leonardo da Vinci's tenderness and the might of his rival Michelangelo Buonarotti. (To my mind, the Hammerklavier's place in the piano repertoire can be compared with that of Michelangelo's Last Judgment in the history of painting). Sviatoslav Richter associated the Fugue (Finale) of the Opus 106 with the building of Noah's Ark; an appropriate comparison, for there truly is something of the Old Testament's titanic force in the Opus 106. The opening of the first movement is alike the Creation: dixitque Deus fiat lux et facta est lux ( God said, Let there be light ; and there was light. ). (Genesis 1:3) Now I am writing a sonata which shall be my greatest. said the composer to his pupil Carl Czerny in the summer of (According to Anton Schindler, Czerny performed the Hammerklavier in presence of Beethoven in the spring 1819.) Beethoven realized the degree of his new work's unconventionality: in a letter to the Viennese publisher Artaria he predicted that the Hammerklavier will be played in fifty years. By contemporary standards, it was monstrously long and scandalously difficult: Czerny wrote in Beethoven's conversational scrapbook that a lady in Vienna who had been practicing for months complained that she still could not play the beginning of the sonata. (Charles Rosen 13 ) Nevertheless, Opus 106 was greatly appreciated by connoisseurs, for instance, Franz Liszt, whose performance of the Hammerklavier in Paris (1836) was hailed by Hector Berlioz. At Beethoven's time the Hammerklavier was accessible to a very few performers, but even now, a pianist, who wishes to tackle the Opus 106, should think twice, or even thrice, before climbing this mountain. Hammerklavier's energy is alike volcanic eruption, which signified the commencement of Beethoven's last creative period. The works which followed the Hammerklavier embrace the Missa Solemnis, the Diabelli Variations, the Ninth Symphony, the triad of last piano sonatas and the sublime string quartets. Smaller-scale masterworks like the Bagatelles op. 119 & 126 have to be mentioned as well. Beethoven worked on the Hammerklavier during the years in Mödling (near Vienna) and dedicated the Sonata to his pupil and patron Archduke Rudolf. (Apparently, Beethoven also intended to compose a choral work for the name-day of the Archduke, for, in the sketches, the main theme of the Hammerklavier's first movement appears with the words Vivat, vivat Rudolphus ). The following letter (19 March 1819) to his pupil Ferdinand Ries, who lived in London, shows how distressed Beethoven was at the time of 106 th Opus' creation: 13 Charles Rosen. The Classical Style. London: Faber and Faber, 1997

10 My dear friend, I ask your forgiveness a thousand times for the trouble I cause you. I cannot understand how it is that there are so many mistakes in the copying of the Sonata. This incorrectness no doubt proceeds from my no longer being able to keep a copyist of my own; circumstances have brought this about. May God send me more prosperity! [...] If the Sonata is not suitable for London, I could send another, or you might omit the Largo, and begin at once with the Fugue in the last movement, or the first movement, Adagio, and the third the Scherzo, the Largo, and the Allegro risoluto. I leave it to you to settle as you think best. This Sonata was written at a time of great pressure. It is hard to write for the sake of daily bread; and yet I have actually come to this! We can correspond again about my visit to London. To be rescued from this wretched and miserable condition is my only hope of deliverance, for as it is I can neither enjoy health, nor accomplish what I could do under more favorable auspices. The opening of the first movement Allegro is quintessential for the whole Sonata, for it displays the sharpest juxtaposition of force and lyricism. Let me take a distance from the expressive (and appropriate) exclamation marks in the cliché descriptions of the first movement's powerfulness, and draw the attention to Allegro's wonderful lyrical episodes that show Beethoven's delicacy as eloquently as the climaxes reveal his strength and stubbornness. Numerous passages of the Opus 106 make us think of a string ensemble (quartet or trio) texture, which once again stresses the importance of a thorough study of Beethoven's string quartets (as well as trios). In contrast, Hammerklavier's orchestral version by Felix Weingartner (who cannot be accused of the insufficient knowledge of the instrumentation) sounds pale and rather clumsy next to the piano original. Scherzo is an intermezzo-type movement with the highly interesting middle section. Undoubtedly, the key movements of the Sonata are the third and the Finale: Fuga a tre voci con alcune licenze. Gilels called the third movement Adagio appassionato e con molto sentimento music's Ganges, which flows, flows.... The temporal proportions of the Adagio (in a sonata form) are huge, but unlike some of Schubert's sonata movements (as sublime as they are), which sometimes raise questions about their dimensions, every note of the Hammerklavier's slow movement is indispensable and irreplaceable. Adagio is like a prayer. A lonesome human soul invokes the Almighty. Et invoca me in die tribulationis liberabo te et glorificabis me ( and call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me. ). (Psalm 49:15) Perhaps, the most original page of the Opus 106 is the Largo introduction to the Fugue. Beethoven does not break the silence of Adagio's concluding F sharp major chords. The transfer a semitone lower to F natural creates

11 an almost mysterious effect. Beethoven brings out three (!) potential subjects for the fugue (which can hardly be anticipated) and rejects them. One tries to foresee the future... In vain! The fugue intrudes as unexpected as the waves of the Deluge. The Hammerklavier's Finale is a colossal fugue con alcune licenze. The licenze are the remarkably rare deviations from strict 3-part writing (Donald Francis Tovey 14 ). In this grand fugue Beethoven exploits almost as many contrapuntal devices as there were creatures in Noah's Ark! It is interesting to compare this fugue with its predecessor from the Cello Sonata Opus 102 No. 2, and its successors from the Piano Sonata Opus 110, and especially from the String Quartet Opus 130. As Jürgen Uhde 15 points out, the third subject (which appears like the oasis of peace) is resemblant of the Benedictus from the Missa Solemnis: Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini ( Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord ). The following concluding pages of the fugue continue its way per aspera ad astra and sound like the Hosanna in excelsis!. Since a brief text would not suffice even for a most superficial analytical overview of the Opus 106, I have deliberately refrained from the analysis of the form, tonal relationships etc. To the listeners wishing to deepen their knowledge of the Hammerklavier, I would suggest the aforementioned analyses by Donald Francis Tovey, Charles Rosen, as well as the very substantial essay by Jürgen Uhde. Victor Chestopal Victor Chestopal 14 Donald Francis Tovey. A companion to Beethoven's Pianoforte Sonatas. The Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music, Jürgen Uhde. Beethovens Klaviermusik, Band III. Stuttgart: Philipp Reclam jun., 1980