Reasoning Chopin

“In Chopin’s compositions, boldness is always justified; richness, even exuberance, never interferes with clearness; singularity never degenerates into uncouth fantasticalness; the sculpturing is never disorderly; the luxury of ornament never overloads the chaste eloquence of the principal lines. His best works abound in combinations which may be said to form an epoch in the handling of musical style. Daring, brilliant and attractive, they disguise their profundity under so much grace, their science under so many charms, that it is with difficulty we free ourselves sufficiently from their magical enthrallment, to judge coldly of their theoretical value.”

-Franz Liszt



Context

The theme that opens Chopin’s Etude in E major is a perfect melody. Too declarative of a statement? There is room for interpretation one might say—fine, but perfect does not mean best (a topic where opinion does matters). Perfect has “all the required elements, qualities, [and] characteristics” (oxford.com) and exists in a form that is essentially flawless. Place the value of this melody in any realm you’d like—but one plus one always equals two.
Chopin wrote two complete sets of etudes: Opus 25 and Opus 10, the latter written earlier than Opus 25. Completion dates for Opus 10 span from 1829 to 1832; number 3 was finished sometime in 1832 (chopinmusic.net), one of the last in the set (just for reference, this makes Chopin twenty-two years old). Although his style and compositional technique were close to impeccable at this point, 1832 is still considered early in his career. Where does his eloquent style come from? Chopin studies composition at the Warsaw conservatory under the instruction of Jozef Elsner. Although his education there was focused around the traditional styles of figured bass and counterpoint from the perspective of the classic composers (Beethoven, Haydn, and Mozart, for example), Chopin showed an early inclination toward incredible talent in improvisation and harmonic perfection (chopin.pl/biografia). His time at the conservatory was no doubt influential to his compositional style; to see further into his poetic genius though, one must note the time he spent abroad in Paris (where he eventually settled) and Vienna (chopin.pl/biografia). Essential to understanding the contextual depth of Chopin’s melodies was his love for Poland. The thematic material of his work was saturated with emotional ties to his homeland. Musicologist Arthur Hedley states that Chopin “found within himself and in the tragic story of Poland the chief sources of his inspiration. The theme of Poland's glories and sufferings was constantly before him, and he transmuted the primitive rhythms and melodies of his youth into enduring art forms” (Encyclopedia Britannica). Many of Chopin’s etudes were given names, corresponding either to their structure or some external reference; this Etude in E major is called “Tristesse” (French for “sorrow”).


Open Listening

For analysis purposes, it is important to begin at the beginning. Thus, this description of the piece is the rudimentary reaction to a “once over” open listening (from Vladimir Horowitz, Chopin: Ballades, Preludes, and Etudes, Vol. 2). Click HERE for the Horowitz performance.
• Obvious first statement of the thematic melody in the right hand accompanied by constant 16th notes in the left hand (Alberti bass)
• This theme repeats itself (as far as can tell at this point), 0:33
• Chromaticism for dramatic effect building to some climax at 1:00
• Descending melody to follow
• At 1:16, tempo change, character change
• The original set mood by the opening melody juxtaposed with upbeat right hand 16th notes and staccato in left hand
• Some kind of chromaticism (or modulation) at 1:34, this then repeats
• At 1:44, chromatic descending left hand to retard and chromatic everywhere
• 2:12, some varied form of the second, more upbeat theme.
• Huge rallentando, repeat opening melody
• For lack of a better term, let us call that unexplainable musical moment that happens every-so-often in genius compositions, “it”. Ones ear (in an open listening) first thinks that “it” (within the melody) happens at 2:48, but then the progression pushes to 2:54 where “it” seems to be—until 2:59, and then you know that this is “it”—for real this time.

Even in an open listening, the effect of performance is vital. Horowitz has mastered the content of this etude; both as a work of technical intensity and emotionally charged fluidity. John Rusnak is, unlike Horowitz, musically idiotic. He destroys the melody with his constant rubato. The tempo is thus unidentifiable and without it, emotion is irrelevant. His performance is in fact emotionally and theoretically useless. Listening to his recording is the physical equivalent of riding with an immature driver who has an uncontrollable love for both the gas and brake pedals (John Rusnak, Chopin Etudes). Click HERE for the Rusnak recording.


Analysis

The approach to this analysis will be in a traditional style overview with an emphasis on performance and psychology of hearing.
For the purpose it serves, an etude does not follow a typical or necessarily recognizable form. The purpose being, as defined by the Oxford Dictionary of Music, “a basis for the improvement of the performer's technique. In performance music the term is especially applied to a short piece restricted to the exploitation of one kind of passage” (oxfordmusiconline.com). What Chopin has done though, is combined his genius for seamless melodies with this purpose of technical improvement. This third etude of Opus 10 stays true to the nature of an etude in opening with the melodic theme (A), all the while, demanding the performers attention in the constant 16th note undercurrent (which never ceases throughout the entire work). In a sweeping glance, the form progresses from the opening melody (A), through a series of developments (B), and back to the original theme (A). This is however, merely surface.
The melody can be seen in three different subdivisions: First, as an overarching sixteen bar phrase landing on the down beat of the seventeenth bar, and closing into bar twenty-one. Second, the phrases are two, nearly identical eight bar lines. Third, and most in depth, is to see each eight bar progression as a set of five and three. The first set of five bars building to a peak in bar three and closing at the end of bar five. This then is picked up by the down beat of bar six, and added three bar “extra” to support the first five. This cycle then repeats until the fortissimo at bar seventeen. The end of this opening theme can be seen as the beginning of a new key, the transitional period into B major, unless of course you see it as more sudden, making the key change only four 16th notes before the down beat of bar twenty-two (the beginning of the B section).
This new section is clear as both a visual change in the style notations (staccato in the left hand), and audibly in its new tempo and key. An “agitated contrast”, Charles Rosen calls it (The Romantic Generation). The B section is an eight bar phrase which is subdivided into two four bar patterns; the first in B major, and the second in c-sharp minor. As Chopin progresses away from the melody, the tonality becomes more and more obscure. Although B major and c-sharp minor are identifiable, this entire development is moving deeper into a chromatic realm. This continues in full force until the quieter, safer, and comprehensible transition back to A. Chopin is like his barely overlapping contemporary Brahms, in that his generation did not produce functionally ambiguous works (for the most part), but one can taste it in the darker whirlwinds of a section such as this one.
Bar thirty marks the onset of C, eight bars of a theoretically organized (but audibly confusing) transition to D. The progression (using guitar notation for analysis purposes) begins in A major and changes on the down beat of every successive bar: A major – A minor – C sharp diminished seven – (pick-up into bar thirty-four, F sharp major/minor nine) – B major – B minor – D sharp half-diminished seven – (pick-up into bar thirty-eight, G sharp major/minor nine) – E sharp diminished seven – A sharp diminished seven – D sharp diminished seven – G sharp diminished seven – and for the love of God FINALLY – B major. The last four bars of the diminished sequence mark the beginning of the D section. Each bar serves as chromatic run to the down beat of the following bar (it is still a technical study, even though the sheer perfection of the melody blurs its original function). The last four bars of D continue to employ the chromatic runs as the first four (but divided between the left and right hands, for the lighter version of the solid block chords that came previously) suggesting the peak point in these technically extreme passages is about to arrive… and it does. The sister chromatic passage to the beginning of D. Only this time the progression isn’t entirely scaler, they jump intervals falling and rising in opposite motion. This continues from bar fourty-six to fifty-four, where the transition into the final A section picks up.
It is not as though the end is exactly the same as the beginning. Logically this makes sense as the notes are all the same (and in the same order), but to take a melody like this and move it through the bleak harsh of Chopin’s twisted chromaticism, one can’t leave it to logic at the end. This closing melody is new. The print (of this score) even suggests a quieter dynamic for this second time around. The dynamic however is not what carries the weight of this slight change. It is the act of what developed from B to E, and its impending effect in the ears and to the (so called) repeated melody. How does this work? Because it is constantly in question as a “listener’s subconscious recollection of the motifs and patterns of earlier themes” (A Guide to Musical Analysis) develops further as the subconscious act of re-collecting is in itself a process that plays some kind of role on the initial memory. All of these processes leading to the effect on the final colors of the now cultured melody.


Favorite Performances:

Arthur Rubinstein
Claudio Arrau
Glen Gould
Vladimir Horowitz