Franz Schubert, Musical Moment No 3

With the disappearance of the princes, church lords, and various patrons who had previously ensured their subsistence, Romantic musicians had to fend for themselves in the XIX century, which had a true impact on the universe of genres and compositions of the new era. The salon of the rising bourgeoisie and decadent aristocracy will take an important turn in the character of its social activities, adding to the political reflection and literary novelties, an increasing interest in art and music. The piano, in addition to being a status symbol, became a guest of honor in the salons, a sign of good taste. And for this instrument, composers would feel called upon to write short pieces for the enjoyment and pleasure of the new class.

Thus, nocturnes, preludes, impromptus, and musical moments flooded the musical universe of the early 19th century. Sometimes their publication would generate revenues that, for this new musician, deprived of patronage, could get him out of a financial quagmire, even though, as is obvious, the biggest slice remained in the hands of the publisher. It was in this way that Franz Schubert managed, for example, to get some breathing space with the Impromptus Opus 90, in 1827.

Musical Moments

The following year, suffering from illness but still in high spirits, Schubert sent to his publisher, for similar purposes, a series of six short pieces to be published as a set, though without indicating how the work was to be titled. Four of them were of recent creation; the third and last, from 1823 and 1824, respectively.

Franz Schubert (1797 - 1828)
by W.A. Rieder, 1825

The "French" title
The Viennese editor, following the tradition that considered it glamorous to speak and write in French, titled them pretentiously in that language, ascribing them to the genre "musical moments". But where it should have said "Moments," he wrote "momens", and where it should have said "Musicaux" he wrote "musicals". And so they were published, in July 1828, when Schubert was not in a position to ask for corrections of any kind, for by then the little master was only fighting for his life, which would finally end in November of that year.

Musical Moment No. 3 in F minor - 5 virtuosos
Composed in 1823, as already noted, it has become the most popular of the series, perhaps because of the display of a certain oriental flavor that encouraged the publisher to add the subtitle "Air Russe", this time correctly written.

Marked allegro moderato, it is presented here in a version by five piano masters, since it lasts less than two minutes. The masters are Seong Jin Cho, Yulianna Avdeeva, Vladimir Horowitz, Natasha Stojanovska, and Kit Armstrong.