iBach:English Suite III,Allemande,Pieksämäki Poleeni 24.8.-11
The 27 Chopin Etudes
Chopin composed his 24 Etudes op. 10 and 25 within a short period of time; only four
years separate their publication dates. The first Etude dates from 1829; it was probably
op. 10 no. 8 and was followed by nos. 9, 10 and 11. The Revolution Etude (op. 10 no.
12) was composed in 1831, as a reaction to the Russians? occupation of Warsaw, his
childhood home. The last to be added to this op. 10 published in 1833 were nos. 3 &
4. By 1834 Chopin must have composed the last of the Etudes (1 & 12) in op. 25,
because he performed the entire opus in Paris. It was, however, not published until
1837. The date of composition of the three op. posth. Etudes published in 1840 is not
known.
Chopin was inspired to write his Etudes after hearing the ones composed by the
virtuoso violinist Paganini. At the time he was still dreaming of a career as a concert
pianist. Luckily for posterity, his delicate piano sound got a somewhat cool reception
in Paris, and he preferred to perform in private to his admiring connoisseur friends and
pupils. In all his life he gave no more than about 30 public concerts and was thus able,
as a composer, to avoid the traps of trying to please the public.
The piano had, by this time, entered a new stage in its development. Now, for the
first time, it could be played fast and loud. The new dampers and pedals allowed the
strings to resonate for a long time and hence produce a sustained, singing tone. No one
before Chopin had ever made the piano sing like he did, and he was a pioneer in the
use of the pedal. He himself claimed that, being unfamiliar with the old keyboard
school, he could not establish a new one. For as a student in Poland he had been left to
progress on his own for lack of a sufficiently competent teacher. By contrast, he did
receive a firm grounding in music theory and especially counterpoint. The counterpoint
in his music is very linear and could well be called ?polymelodic?. He was a
master duet writer, and indeed, piano playing is basically always a duet between the left
and the right hand. Never in the Etudes is there a moment when both hands do not
sing. Even in the quickest ones Chopin attains a singing quality, and most of them bear
the marking legato.
Numerous piano etudes had been published, but no one until Chopin had produced
ones that were works of art fit for concert performance. Chopin extended the
concept of piano technique to cover more than speed and muscle. For him, technique
also meant touch and timbre, and a command of counterpoint, harmony and rhythm.
He was the first to make music out of etudes and etudes out of music. Not only was he
the greatest piano teacher in the history of music; he was also the greatest composer for
the piano.
Chopin studied and admired Johann Sebastian Bach. Before each public performance
he played only music by Bach to himself. The Bach WK 1 Preludes and Fugues
(such as the Preludes in C and F sharp) are clearly reflected in the Etudes. Chopin?s
style of composition was strongly influenced not only by Polish folk music but also by
the Italian bel canto (Bellini) operatic style he so greatly admired and his liking for the
cello and the singing human voice. It is also possible to detect in his music echoes of
the piano composers Field and Hummel.
The 24 Chopin Etudes plus the three published posthumously do not follow any
regular key system in the manner of his 24 Preludes or the 24 Preludes and Fugues by
Bach. The keys are, however, clearly arranged to produce an artistic entity: majorminor,
relative major-minor or in a third-fifth relationship. Op. 25 no. 11 follows its
predecessor at a distance of a whole tone. Not all 24 keys are even represented. Yet not
a single Etude could be transposed to a different key, so beautifully do they express
their own key, being the product of that key alone. Each Etude also addresses the
keyboard problems peculiar to its specific key. Chopin?s pedagogical wisdom and genius
are manifest in the way each Etude focuses mainly on a single aspect of piano
technique, such as thirds, sixths, octaves, broken chords, arpeggios, repetitions, leaps,
the left hand, or, as in op. post. 3, polyrhythms and voice leading.
Etudes are descended from the improvisatory Preludes of the Baroque. In these the
player selects some figure and repeats it to improvise a piece. In etudes this figure is a
rhythmical or technical unit the repetition of which is chiefly designed to strengthen
the fingers or technique. For practical reasons, each Chopin Etude is short, lasting only
a few minutes. Having played one, the pianist begins a different exercise or takes a rest
during a slower, singing one. In places they sound almost improvisatory. Chopin is said
to have improvised op. 25 no. 2 on the spot, on a theme given him by a woman.
Some of the Etudes are constructed on the A-B-A scheme, others are throughcomposed
and feature small-scale development. Examples of the most clearly throughcomposed
exercises are op. 25 no. 1 and op. posth. no. 1. In these the initial theme
never returns as such in the original key and instead undergoes development before
climaxing and subsiding. Then again, the form of many of the Etudes, such as op. 25
nos. 6 & 8, is somewhere between through-composed and A-B-A. The majority nevertheless
come closer in form to A-B-A, with or without a coda, though not one is purely
A-B-A because the B material consists either of harmonic modulations or sequences on
A or is a ?second theme? differing only slightly from the A material. The only Etudes
where B is clearly different from the opening A are op. 10 no. 3 and op. 25 nos. 5 &
10.
This predictability and similarity of form gives listeners a feeling of security, permitting
them to marvel in peace at what happens to each theme or rhythmic unit.
They are also free to savour the inherent nature of each key and to enjoy the composer?s
melodies and harmonies. Chopin?s melodies are always basically diatonic, even though
he is a master of chromaticism. His phrases are always symmetrical on a larger scale,
but they often incorporate smaller sub-phrases that may be asymmetrical, as in op. 10
no. 3 in E. The Etudes reflect the Slav liking for modulations to the raised fourth or
lowered second degree and a lowered and raised 2nd and 7th note in the scale, creating
a despairing mood in the minor. The Slav legacy is in other respects, too, audible
throughout his output, in the rhythms and quick major-minor shifts, for example.
Chopin was very patriotic, but his Polish style is still only just emerging in his Etudes.
The Etudes vary tremendously in character. Chopin?s skill in determining their
order makes the set as a whole a major work of art. Their key relations and their almost
dramatic mood changes create an overall experience, as can be appreciated on listening
to them one after the other. Music was, for Chopin, communication, i.e. language – or
rather poetry. He was also theatrically talented. He was able, for a joke, to imitate
different characters and conjure up roles and personal caricatures not only on the piano
but also in his musical forms. It is this variability of character from one Etude to
the next that is so interesting. At the most dramatic points he may even write fff, i.e.
extremely loud, as in op. 10 nos. 4 & 12, in the triumphant closing arpeggios of op. 25
no. 5 and in the last three Etudes of op. 25, after which the quieter op. posth. Etudes
create a sense of an epilogue-like serenity. The heroic C major Etude begins the set and
should, according to the edition I have chosen, be played forte throughout. Passages
marked ppp (extremely soft) are to be found in op. 10 no. 9 and op. 25 nos. 1 & 7.
Chopin had 150 pupils, and for some he wrote tailored advice, performing instructions
and practice hints in their copies of his music. All those who had received advice
then published their own editions of his Etudes, with the resulting present confusion
as to which are Chopin?s original instructions and which are not. Unfortunately no one
knows for sure the truth about some of the details, and various alternatives exist. The
player has to choose which edition to believe. The fact that Chopin himself was physically
weakened by illness has also added to the confusion. He simply did not have the
strength to play loudly and he was criticised for his slight sound. At heart he was not
slight but very masculine and aristocratic. Anyone who imitates Chopin?s own manner
of playing will be led astray, because he would have liked to produce a bigger sound but
could not. On the other hand he loathed hammering on the piano and always tried to
achieve as beautiful, singing a tone as possible. Chopin can never be played too beautifully.
Some of the dynamics markings are disputable, as in op. 10 no. 5. In many of the
editions this study is printed forte and piano instructions and the tempo marking is
Vivace, but the ?original? Chopin manuscript does not give any dynamic variations for
the main theme, only leggierissimo and legatissimo, not Vivace. Creating breathing spaces
in the set as a whole are the Etudes that give the impression of being more in the
nature of Nocturnes or Preludes (such as op. 10 nos. 3 & 6 and op. 25 nos. 5 & 7and the 3 Etudes op. posth).
These Etudes bear some ridiculous metronome markings in the modern editions.
For ex Chopin himself did not give any metronome markings for Etude op. 10 no. 6, but
some editions give an insanely quick 69 per half-bar. Players are instructed to perform
op. 10 no. 3 both Lento (ma non troppo) and Vivace (ma non troppo) and must therefore
decide for themselves whether it is a lively, jaunty piece or a tranquil aria.
Chopin himself said of his Etude in E op. 10 no. 3 that its melody is his best. Contemporary
listeners said of his own performance:
- He was like a singer who does not bother unnecessarily about his accompanist but who
freely follows his intuition and his feelings.
- His desire is not to conquer but to love.
- While he was playing, I was so moved that I had to leave the room two or three times in
order to compose myself?
Chopin was born in Poland in either 1809 or 1810 and moved to Paris in 1831.
Throughout his life he suffered from weak lungs, and finally from tuberculosis, of
which he died in 1849. He had a deeply religious upbringing and high moral standards,
but during the years in Paris, away from his mother and his devout Polish friends,
he became hardened and sceptical. On his deathbed he reverted to his faith. A
childhood friend, a priest, said as the composer?s lay dying that Chopin?s death was his
most beautiful concerto.
Anne Kauppi