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THE AUTHENTIC CHOPIN AND LISZT PIANO TRADITION GERARD CARTER BEc LL B (Sydney) A Mus A (Piano Performing) WENSLEYDALE PRESS 1 2 THE AUTHENTIC CHOPIN AND LISZT PIANO TRADITION 3 4 THE AUTHENTIC CHOPIN AND LISZT PIANO TRADITION GERARD CARTER BEc LL B (Sydney) A Mus A (Piano Performing) WENSLEYDALE PRESS 5 Published in 2008 by Wensleydale Press ABN 30 628 090 446 165/137 Victoria Street, Ashfield NSW 2131 Tel +61 2 9799 4226 Email [email protected] Designed and printed in Australia by Wensleydale Press, Ashfield Copyright © Gerard Carter 2008 All rights reserved. This book is copyright. Except as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968 (for example, a fair dealing for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review) no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior permission. Enquiries should be made to the publisher. ISBN 978-0-9805441-2-1 This publication is sold and distributed on the understanding that the publisher and the author cannot guarantee that the contents of this publication are accurate, reliable, complete or up to date; they do not take responsibility for any loss or damage that happens as a result of using or relying on the contents of this publication and they are not giving advice in this publication. 6 7 8 CONTENTS Chapter 1: Introduction ... 11 Chapter 2: Chopin and Liszt as composers ...19 Chapter 3: Chopin and Liszt as pianists and teachers ... 29 Chapter 4: Chopin tradition through Mikuli ... 55 Chapter 5: Liszt tradition through Stavenhagen and Kellermann ... 63 Chapter 6: Nineteenth century interpretative devices in Chopin and Liszt ... 91 Chapter 7: Chopin and Liszt tradition through their pupils and disciples ... 123 Bibliography ... 213 About the author ... 215 Publications by Wensleydale Press ... 217 List of illustrations ... 219 Illustrations ... 221 9 10 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Chopin Frédéric Chopin (1810-1849) is one of the four great romantic composers for piano, the others being Liszt, Schumann and Brahms. Chopin’s piano works are much-loved and he is regarded as the most original and influential piano composer of all time. Of the many composers born around 1810 it is Chopin whose music has proven the most widely enduring. While Liszt better typifies the virtuoso of the period and Schumann more audaciously epitomises the romantic spirit, Chopin emerges as the most consistently excellent craftsman. His highly refined style, generously lyrical, boldly chromatic and miraculously pianistic, transcends each of its components. Chopin was born in the village of Żelazowa Wola in the Duchy of Warsaw to a Polish mother and French-expatriate father and became a child-prodigy pianist. In November 1830, at the age of twenty, Chopin went abroad. After the subsequent outbreak and suppression of the Polish uprising he never returned to Poland. In Paris Chopin made a comfortable living as a composer and piano teacher, while giving a number of public piano recitals. From 1837 to 1847 he had a turbulent relationship with French novelist Mme Aurore Dudevant, known as George Sand. He was always in frail health, suffering, not from tuberculosis as has been usually stated, but from an incurable, genetic disease, either cystic fibrosis or alpha one antitrypsin deficiency syndrome. He died in 1849 at the age of 39. Chopin’s compositions all include the piano, predominantly as a solo instrument, and although his music is technically demanding its style emphasises nuance and expressive depth rather than technical virtuosity for its own sake. Chopin invented new musical forms such as the ballade and introduced major innovations into existing forms such as the piano sonata, waltz, nocturne, étude, impromptu and prelude. His piano works are mainstays of the nineteenth century romantic piano repertoire and his mazurkas and polonaises remain the cornerstone of Polish national music. 11 Although Chopin lived in the 1800s, he was educated in the tradition of Mozart, Clementi and Beethoven, and he used Clementi’s piano method with his own pupils. He was also influenced by the piano works of Hummel and Weber. Chopin regarded most of his contemporaries with some indifference, although he had many acquaintances associated with romanticism in music, literature and arts, many of them through his liaison with George Sand. Chopin’s music is considered by many to be at the peak of the romantic style, but the relative classical purity and discretion in his music reflect his reverence for Bach and Mozart. Chopin never indulged in explicit scene-painting in his music and he disliked programmatic titles for his pieces. Chopin himself was slight and graceful, with fair hair and distinguished features. He never weighed more than seven stone. He was gifted with perfect control of movement that showed itself not only in his piano playing but also in his skill as a caricaturist and in his extraordinary powers of mimicry. To Chopin moving in the best circles meant everything. He dressed in the height of fashion and kept a carriage. He had a precise mind and precise manners, was witty and was ultra conservative in his aesthetic tastes. He made a good deal of money and spent it lavishly, complaining that he did not have more. He once said: ‘You think I make a fortune? Carriages and white gloves cost more, and without them one would not be in good taste.’ He always dressed impeccably for his lessons: hair curled, shoes polished, clothes elegant. Good taste meant everything to him. It certainly meant more to him than the romantic movement sweeping Europe. That he avoided as much as he could. He even disliked the word ‘romanticism’. Delacroix was perhaps his closest friend but he did not even understand or like the paintings of Delacroix. Chopin’s relations with the musicians of his day did not depend on his regard for their music. He was not enthusiastic about the compositions of Schumann or Mendelssohn. He did not like Berlioz’s music but admired him as a person. Differences of temperament and one indiscretion on the part of Liszt turned their early intimacy into a polite acquaintance. Chopin’s favourite composers were Bach, Mozart and Scarlatti. He studied them thoroughly and their ideals of workmanship figured in his own music. He was very fond of the operas of Bellini. 12 Chopin’s moods fluctuated from the despair to nonchalance and he reacted in extremes to events around him. He could be cool, calculating and cynical and a moment later enthusiastic, cheerful and boisterously vulgar. It is only in his letters written in Polish that we find the real Chopin. He never wrote freely in any other language. What he sometimes wrote in Polish would surprise those who only know his character from the sentimental utterances of his pupils and casual acquaintances. Cortot wrote of Chopin’s health: ‘The facts indicate human weaknesses and a certain lack of mental balance, which most people at any rate will attribute to his poor state of health ... his sudden transitions from a state of depression to one of excitability are the classic symptoms of tuberculosis from which he suffered more and more acutely during the unhappy years of unequal struggle between an enfeebled will to live and the growing threats of physical misery.’ Arthur Rubinstein wrote: ‘Chopin was a genius of universal appeal. His music conquers the most diverse audiences. When the first notes of Chopin sound through the concert hall there is a happy sigh of recognition. All over the world men and women know his music. They love it. They are moved by it. Yet it is not “Romantic music” in the Byronic sense. It does not tell stories or paint pictures. It is expressive and personal, but still a pure art. Even in this abstract atomic age, where emotion is not fashionable, Chopin endures. His music is the universal language of human communication. When I play Chopin I know I speak directly to the hearts of people!’ Liszt Franz Liszt (1811-1886) was born in Raiding, Hungary and died in Bayreuth at the age of 74. His parents were of German background. In his early years he lived and taught in Paris and, after a successful career as a travelling piano virtuoso, he established residence in Weimar in 1848 and later in Rome in 1869. In his final years from 1869 he divided his time between Budapest, Weimar and Rome. Liszt was perhaps the greatest pianist of all time and wrote many original works and arrangements for the piano. He possessed the most pianistic mind in history and expanded and revealed the full potential of the piano more than any other composer. His innovations in keyboard technique have never been equalled. 13 Liszt’s piano compositions inspired and influenced the listeners of his own era and set the stage for the late romantic, impressionistic and atonal schools. Liszt used the device of transformation of themes, where a motif is varied, developed and transformed into different themes expressing contrasting emotions, most significantly in his epoch-making Sonata in B minor, in other piano works and in his symphonic poems, piano concertos and symphonies. Liszt invented the solo piano recital and masterclass which are the mainstay of modern audiences. He had perfect pitch and was the first pianist to perform entirely from memory. He altered the course of musical history by deviating from the traditionalists who followed Beethoven’s classical structures. Liszt was a musical philanthropist and selflessly promoted the compositions and careers of fellow composers Richard Wagner (1813-1883), Edvard Grieg (1843- 1907) and Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921) and many other musicians and pianists. In public Liszt was flamboyant and charismatic but in private he was caring, unselfish, humble and generous.

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