Eric Lu: Notes on the Program
“A momentous poetic touch”
Ta-da! It’s November and we are at the third of the three fall recitals for this new season of PPI! November can seem like the wet blanket it literally often is: short days stealing away our early-fall joy, dark mornings, wet commutes. But, there are several bright spots, too – Thanksgiving with its comforting cuisine, stores smelling like pumpkin spice and decorated in autumnal colors, musical programs on offer all around our city.
What a true blessing, then, to have Eric Lu with us today, bringing us some of the most spellbinding music ever written! The tagline for today’s event, “A momentous poetic touch,” brings to mind an artist with a giant palette, dabbing swaths of vibrant color onto a dull canvas. Eric truly paints and poeticizes at the piano. In choosing an exclusively Romantic program, he is by no means selling cheap prints or spinning cotton candy, though. Au contraire: He is bringing to life a vast soundscape of intense feeling and experience, coloring our wintry hearts with every possible shade of darkness and light.
Two morsels to further contextualize your listening:
Although Schubert technically falls into the late Classical period, op. post.142 was composed just a year before his death and published more than a decade after, in 1839, the same year that Schumann composed his op.18. In this sense, the work is solidly Romantic in terms of both its style and time of composition.
Starting with Schumann and closing with Chopin is more than accidental – it’s quite literally balancing the scale. Although much is often made of the great masters of the Baroque sharing a birth year (Bach, Handel and Domenico Scarlatti were all born in 1685), it’s far less celebrated that both Schumann and Chopin were born in 1810. Also born in that year? P.T. Barnum, American showman and businessman, heavily romanticized and fictionalized in the powerful 2017 musical The Greatest Showman. What is historically accurate, however, is the strong ties Barnum had to Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind, who in turn helped write one of the first biographies of Chopin. And who’s to say that not everything is connected?)
ROBERT SCHUMANN
Arabeske, op. 18
Perfectly in keeping with the image of pianist-as-artist, Eric sets today’s tone with this gorgeous Arabeske, a solo instrumental work that borrows its name from the art world. Also sometimes spelled “Arabesque”, the term, literally meaning “in the Arabic style” refers to ornamental designs featuring intertwined, flowing lines. Transposed to music, it refers to a highly ornamental melody whose free unfolding expresses a slowing of time within the composition. To quote the excellent website of the Clark Art Institute in Massachusetts, “Unlike the straight line, which is the most direct path from A to B, the curving movement of the arabesque creates an effect of circular phrases that conjure perpetual melodies.” (Similarly, the arabesque in ballet is a pose where the dancer creates a long, flowing line by extending one leg straight behind the body while balancing on the other leg, with the arms held in harmonious positions. This creates an elegant and visually appealing line.)
How does all of this translate to what we’re listening to today? By giving us a metaphor with which to understand the sound, rather than the structure of Schumann’s piece. The Arabeske is composed in a slightly modified ABACA-rondo form (nothing complicated or overly artificial), but it obtains a lyrical, improvisational quality by means of the florid, fluid filigrees of sound that render the overall quality of the work “light as a feather but carrying the weight of a poet’s heart” (to quote an excellent analysis of the work on a podcast hosted by music students at LeTourneau University in Texas).
Written during a period of emotional turbulence, when 29-year-old Robert was in Vienna, separated from his fiancée Clara, the Arabeske is at once probing and soothing. The main theme, marked “Leicht und zart” (light and tender), creates a sense of continuity and calm. Then the piece shifts to the minor, becoming more introspective, while not moving away dramatically from the initial vantage point of light-footed balance and order. The second contrasting theme heightens the intensity, introducing with what sounds like musical pliés (accented, elongated top notes, propelling the melodic weight forward) a sense of urgency and questioning. With every return of the original theme, it’s as if the dancer moves back to an original position, having stretched and strengthened a new muscle group; more at home in his or her body than before. When we arrive at the coda, marked “Zum schloss, langsam” (ending, slowly), it’s almost as if we’re already listening to Debussy as far as the dreamy tone quality and arpeggiated left hand patterns are concerned. At the same time, there’s certainly also something Beethovenian at play (reminiscent of the “Moonlight” sonata). The delicate sense of calm resolution is decidedly forward-looking – worlds away from hopeless resignation, which this period in Schumann’s life certainly could have led to, but, lucky for us, didn’t!
FRANZ SCHUBERT
Four Impromptus, Op. posth. 142, D. 935
“Schubert Impromptus – Heaven on earth” (A YouTube admirer of this piece)
Schubert composed eight impromptus in total, all during 1827 (a year before his death), following short on the heels of his song cycle Winterreise. Although the term “impromptu” implies a relaxed spontaneity, hinting at something effortless and easy, the technical challenges posed by these pieces fall well outside the range of amateurs, which is the reason why only two of them (the first two impromptus of op. 90) were published during his lifetime. During the early nineteenth century, impromptus (literally meaning “something done without preparation”) were generally simple in design, technically not too demanding and ideal for salon playing. Schubert knew this and yet didn’t compromise or give up his individuality. The pieces are structurally and thematically linked – so much so that some scholars, including Robert Schumann – believed them to be part of a multi-movement sonata. One could drill very deep into these theories, but in the end (at least for us!) the joy lies in listening and watching, rather than analyzing!
No.1 in F Minor: Here is the prime example of a piano piece that is as rewarding to listen to as it is utterly fascinating to watch. Just look at the constant crossing of hands – not done for show, but for balancing the voicing. In this impromptu, the left hand is doing a whole lot of the singing, often carrying the melody. The right hand is often running hither and tither, doing the bulk of the the accompaniment. To me, this is undoubtedly a passionate conversation between the hands. Fill in your own scenario once the dialogue really gets going (about three minutes into the piece). Mine goes something like this: “But I just told you!” / “No you did not!” / “Oh yes I told you!” /“No, you forgot!”
This is not an argument, though, it’s a tender exchange of two equally valid views, skillfully worked out with complete understanding and cooperation. Sometimes the two hands double each other exactly, moving blissfully in the same direction. There is beautiful harmony as we shift, together, up and down the keyboard, and find, in music, a fabulous example of how to be good communicators!
No.2 in A-flat Major: Set in one of Schubert’s favorite keys, this is certainly one of the most tender pieces of music ever written, and likely the most vulnerable a major modality can possibly be made to feel. This is something truly Schubertian: using the “happy” scale to take us to that place in your throat before you cry, or that weird warm sensation tingling up your arms when you can’t quite distinguish whether it’s intense joy or intense sadness electrifying your body. Written in minuet form (ABA) it features a main section (melody with chordal accompaniment) and a contrasting middle section. It’s in this D-flat major trio which the British musicologist Richard Wigmore tells us to listen for the shadowy outline of the main melody against swirling triplet figurations – creating what he calls “a magical, echt-Romantic texture.”
No.3 in B-flat Major is the “simplest” at the outset, and certainly the most songlike. The theme – which Schubert also used in his Rosamunde incidental music and in his A minor string quartet, D.804 – is now the subject of a set of five variations, all rich in texture and nostalgic harmonies. Despite the ambling simplicity of the theme, there is something piercing about this impromptu, pulling us right into the depths of the keyboard.
No. 4 in F Minor is marked Allegro scherzando – instructing the player to be lively, playful and cheerful. To borrow from Richard Wigmore’s descriptions again: “There is a distinct whiff of the Hungarian puszta in this brilliant, spicily humorous piece with its disruptive cross-rhythms (duple versus triple time) and riotous, dissonant trills.” (Puszta refers to the vast Hungarian plains, associated with nomadic life, folk music, and vibrant, sometimes melancholic, moods.) Schubert’s imagination here is robust and energetic. We hear (and again, see) crazy scale patterns following a massive climax, and while this seems weirdly experimental and modern for a piece composed in 1827, his playful, teasing pauses and unexpected return to the original theme tastes surprisingly like the classical greatness of Haydn!
FRÉDÉRIC CHOPIN
Polonaise in B-flat Major, op. 71, no. 2
The Polonaise is to Chopin as Powell’s City of Books is to Portland: There is a whole lot more to the composer (and the city) than just that one thing … and yet, the one is almost impossible to imagine without the other. Chopin wrote his first Polonaise in 1817, at age 7, and his last in 1846, three years before his death. Yet, when called to name a Chopin Polonaise, the one you will hear today is probably not the first one that would spring to mind. Unlike the “Military” Polonaise in A, op. 40, no. 1, and the “Heroic” Polonaise in A-flat, op. 53, Op. 71, no.2 was not published until after his death. Interestingly it was never earmarked by the composer himself for publication, being a juvenile work from his teenage years in Poland, and thus not yet displaying his bravura, developed style. It’s awfully close, though! As the ultimate Chopin scholar, professor Mieczysław Tomaszewski puts it: “This work admirably reconciles the conventional with the original, the coquetry of the salons with the approaching Romantic watershed. It is designed with a remarkable, precise, Classical symmetry. Within that framework appear accents of a dramatic dialogue – as yet rather timid but presaging what would become so important for Chopin’s mature style: a dynamism resulting from contrast and opposition.”
Looking at the sheet music (the original manuscript available to us is, interestingly, a copy in Chopin’s sister Ludwika’s hand), what pops out to me is the signature melodic complexity and fabulously virtuosic rhythmic patterns. Within a few bars, we have trills, triplets, quintuplets, 11-tuplets and 13-tuplets (no formal terms for these last two!) – a dizzying array of subtly different tools for creating tension. To imagine seeing a teenaged Chopin coming up with these wonders is enough to make one wish for time-travel. And to hear him play this himself? The German poet Heinrich Heine (a contemporary and admirer of Chopin) may well have been thinking of Polonaises when he referred to Chopin as “the Raphael of the pianoforte.”
FRÉDÉRIC CHOPIN
Sonata no. 3 in B Minor, op. 58
What is new is not necessarily immediately understood or appreciated. On 28 October 1844, the following attack on Chopin appeared in the London periodical The Musical World (incidental to a review of some mazurkas): “… from our point of view we can see no connection whatsoever between philosophy and affectation, between poetry and swagger, and we would allow ourselves to call to witness the ears and the judgment of all impartial people that all the works of Mr. Chopin present a gaudy palette of rhetorical overstatement and excruciating cacophony …”
Wow. Let that sink in. That poor Chopin was working on his Sonata no.3 in B Minor during this very same time period and that he didn’t resign himself to never composing again speaks volumes! When his third Sonata did appear (in 1845) it was (surprise, surprise) also not universally loved. Franz Liszt, among Chopin’s most famous frenemies, was utterly under-impressed and called the Sonata out for its “lack of focus” and “too many motives.” One (English) critic went so far as to say that the finale went “beyond the bounds of decency”.
Today, we certainly have a completely different set of expectations as far as “the bounds of decency” goes, and, I’m fairly certain that unless the pianist is playing naked, the word “indecent” would never cross our minds where the classical repertoire is concerned. What we hear, instead, is ingenuity and originality – and a composer’s resolute confidence to tackle a weighty genre on his own terms.
Already in the first movement (Allegro maestoso) do we see a truly visionary composer at work reinventing the sonata form. The music does not end with the polarity between the first and second themes; rather, the themes themselves contain small motives that in turn provide the drive to an incessant outpouring of melodies. Unlike the classical sonata blueprint, the music never returns to its first theme: Instead we land on the majestic second theme, closing the first movement not in the home key, but in B Major.
The second movement (Scherzo) is short – offering us a brief reprieve after the intense, philosophical first movement. The opening motif is repeated three times, travelling up the keyboard as if offering us three different characters with similar traits but different weights (father, mother, baby). Again and again, the playful, minimalistic Chopin uses the minimum material to maximum effect, creating flowing, even floating music that weaves different strands of melody into a slow-moving contrapuntal conversation.
This brings us to the third movement which, just as in the case of Sonata No. 2 and the “Funeral March”, forms the heart of the work. If poetry is what defines today’s recital, this is it, 100%, offering what Chopin specialist Grzegorz Niemczuk calls “music for people whose souls need a massage”! One senses Chopin’s great love for Italian opera in how he treats the melodic line, leading the listener to some remarkable harmonic twists and turns along the way. If at the end of the movement you’re not well-rested and almost asleep (out of sheer reverie, not boredom!), we’d be rather surprised!
Then the fourth movement arrives – a fast, powerful rondo that immediately shocks us back into the present. From this drama, Chopin gives us a simple rondo, comprising of two different parts (A, B) where the first theme (A) becomes more and more dramatic with every repeat. By using suspensions, more and more tension is built. Octaves in the right hand further increase the bold power of the (intrinsically simple) melody – and one cannot but think of a dam that is about to break. When the climax finally comes, we are dazzled and dizzy, but, as is so often the case with Chopin, not exhausted. We may be quite breathless, but at the same time our energies have been restored. We have been touched by something momentous and poetic!