Johann C. Bach, Sonata for two pianos

Johann Christian Bach was the youngest son of Johann Sebastian. After spending some time in Italy, he settled in London in 1764 having obtained the post of music master to Sophie Charlotte, the German duchess who had come to England to become queen consort to George III. They made a good match. At least they could chat in German when they felt like it. Johann Christian became so successfully integrated there that he was called "the Bach of London".

The new instrument

When he had the good fortune to meet Mozart (the opposite is not untrue), the piano had only recently been invented to replace the harpsichord for good. The story goes that it was the then 30-year-old Bach in London who introduced the little eight-year-old musician from Salzburg to the new instrument. After all, it was Johann Christian who had introduced the new instrument to London.

Johann Christian Bach
(1735 - 1782)

The society of his time

Johann Christian excelled in opera, the genre in which he achieved his greatest successes. And if he did not reach the heights of his father at the keyboard, it was not due to a lack of talent, but to the way in which his life as a musician took shape. Cuthbert Girdlestone, a modern British musicologist, puts it aptly:

"His public asks him for the music that amuses them..... His music is a succession of graceful and refined melodies. His allegros are pleasant, carefree. His andantes, tender and sometimes languid and idyllic, reflect the bucolic dream that enchanted the society of the eighties of the 18th century; his prestos are not lacking in vigor, but the whole is covered by a mask of smiling impersonality that expresses the superficial side of the society for which he wrote..."

Sonata for two pianos Opus 15 No 5

As was becoming customary, the writing for piano for four hands or two pianos responded to the demand for music for the family, intended to be performed at home, in the homes of an incipient middle class increasingly enthusiastic about art, particularly music.

Published in 1778, the sonata for two pianos in G major consists of only two Movements:

00:00  Allegro

06:20  Tempo di minuetto

The performance (audio only) is by the acclaimed duo of Bulgarian pianists Aglika Genova and Liuben Dimitrov. The imprint that JC Bach is going to leave on Mozart is obvious. So in all fairness it can also be said that in 1764 it was Mozart who was the lucky one.

Franz Schubert, Military March No. 1

Along with the "Serenade" and the "Ave Maria", Military March No. 1 is probably one of Franz Schubert's most famous melodies. Popularly known by the simple title "Schubert's military march", it is the first of the series of Three Military Marches for piano four hands published in 1826, as opus 51, by Anton Diabelli in Vienna.

They are assumed to have been written at Szeliz Castle, about 150 km from Vienna, where Schubert spent the summers of 1818 and 1819, engaged as a musical preceptor to the daughters of Count Johann Esterházy, cousin of Haydn's protector.

The girls, Carolina and Maria 

There were two girls: Carolina, 13 years old, and Maria, 15 years old. With Maria, the lessons were more interesting as she showed a more advanced level than her sister, but by the second summer, the little Schubert began to take a sentimental interest in Carolina, who, of course, was now fourteen. But his proverbial shyness did not allow him to go any further. Nevertheless, his letters of the time to his friends in Vienna are brimming with optimism: "I am perfectly alive and composing like a god [...]", he writes in one of them.

The four-hand piano

As the teacher of two sisters, the compositions – written like a God – that could be of most immediate benefit to him were, of course, the four-hand pieces. So the military marches must have been heard more than once in the palace, Schubert accompanying one of the girls or, perhaps, leaning back in an armchair, listening to his pupils with an attentive ear, ready to correct, although with his eyes fixed on Caroline, I suspect.

Military March No. 1

Countless arrangements and versions have been made of the Military March No. 1 (catalogued today as D.733, together with the other two marches). It has been used in multiple TV and film formats. Among the most serious rewritings, stand out for their importance, the Grand paraphrase de concert by Liszt, and the "quote" of Stravinski in Circus Polka (ballet choreographed for dancers and elephants).

Marked allegro vivace and written in the key of D major, the piece presents the traditional ternary structure A-B-A, its final section a frank repetition of the beginning. It lasts about 5 min.

Presented here is the original version for piano four hands by the pianist duo Salim & Sivan.

Liszt, Rondeau fantastique

We know Franz Liszt was the "inventor" of the piano recital. But, what does it mean really?
Well, in other words, he was the first pianist to perform alone on stage, playing all the "numbers" himself. It was 1840 and from then on "collective" concerts went down in history, which along with soloists could include ensembles of the most diverse instruments, as well as a couple of arias performed by the divas of the moment so as not to bore the audience with so much instrumental timbre.

The transcriptions
For this, the artist needed a vast repertoire. Hopefully, of well-known melodies. Then came the piano transcriptions of orchestral works, fantasies on opera themes, and variations on popular motifs.
Liszt, the mass artist of the 19th century, would play them all, always taking care to reserve as a grand finale a piece that would drive the ladies present even madder, ladies and young ladies who might come to blows for the handkerchief thrown to the audience by the charming twenty-nine-year-old artist.
A "bravura" fantasy on a famous Spanish air never failed him.

Rondeau fantastique sur un théme espagnol (A Fantastic Rondo on a Spanish Theme)
This is its original title. And the Spanish theme is the famous pole Yo que soy contrabandista, one of the musical numbers of El poeta calculista, a work by the tenor and composer Manuel García premiered in Madrid in 1805. Liszt composed the rondo in 1836, and was published the following year simultaneously in Leipzig, Milan, and Paris.

Three years earlier, Chopin had dedicated to Liszt the Etudes of Opus 10. He could have reciprocated with this dedication, but the Hungarian master must have considered that one thing was not compatible with the other. It is dedicated, then, to George Sand, who will become Chopin's "friend" only the following year.

The intricacies
Its technical difficulties are grandiose, and the number of pianists who have dared to record it, let alone perform it in public, can be counted on the fingers of one hand. The Russian concert pianist Mikhail Pletnev tried it, but ended up giving up when he saw that the piece was "untouchable," as he put it. Of course, it is also possible that the technical paraphernalia alone has failed to excite many performers of recognized virtuosity.

Courageous Valentina
There are live versions on Youtube in formal settings (Bruni, Howard), but we have preferred to show here the very informal performance, very democratic and far from any divism, that the Ukrainian pianist Valentina Lisitsa decided to offer in a London train station, on an upright piano somewhat out of tune and which apparently has a key that doesn't work. Bravo for the audacity.

Ottorino Respighi: Pines of Rome

It is no exaggeration to say that Italy's role in contemporary music was not as brilliant and influential as in other periods. However, from the generation of the eighties of the 19th century onwards, Italian music did indeed participate in the renewal of musical language and, thanks to the knowledge of its past (which is no small thing), musicians were able to break new ground in the search for new paths. Among these composers – contemporaries of the French musicians who reacted against Germanic post-romanticism (Debussy, Satie, Ravel, to name a few) – Ottorino Respighi stands out as the most famous worldwide among his Italian colleagues.

The "Roman" trilogy

In his early thirties, Respighi settled in Rome after taking over, in 1913, the post of teacher of composition at the Accademia Santa Cecilia. The academy would soon become the Conservatory of Rome, and Ottorino would be appointed director of the prestigious institution in 1924. Seduced by the Roman musical life and the remarkable landscape of the city, he decided, during the first year of his administration, to resume his tribute to the eternal city with the composition of the tone poem Pines of Rome, a tribute that had begun in 1916 with Fontana di Roma, and that would culminate with Feste Romane, in 1928.

Ottorino Respighi, in 1935
1879 - 1936

Pini di Roma
Although in close competition with Fontana... it is the most popular work of the trilogy, and certainly the one that arouses the greatest enthusiasm of the orchestral ensembles of the world. It had its premiere, not without a few setbacks, on December 14, 1924, in Rome.

The theater was packed, but Respighi sensed that the audience would soon be disappointed in the first movement. And indeed there was a considerable whistling at the end of the first section, not at all surprising since the trumpets insist with clatter on a discordant note, completely alien to the tonality in progress [minute 2:31 and later]. In the second movement, the orchestra calmed down, and so did the audience, although it remained intrigued by the development of the work. A resounding ovation greeted the end of the piece.

Movements

Aware that Italian audiences have always been more inclined to opera than to instrumental music, the author included some "explanatory" notes in the hand program, for each of the sections. The following is a synopsis:

00 I Pini di Villa Borghese

Children play around the pines of the Villa Borghese [the opulent mansion of the conspicuous 17th-century Roman family]; they dance in circles, they play at being soldiers, marching and fighting, they come and go in flocks. Suddenly, the scene changes and...

2:50  Pini presso una Catacomba
... we see the shadows of the pine trees framing the entrance to a catacomb. From the depths emerges the sound of a funeral psalm, floating in the air like a solemn hymn, which gradually and mysteriously begins to dissipate.

9:94  I Pini del Gianicolo
The air shivers: The pines of the Gianicolo [Rome's hill from which the best views of the city are enjoyed] can be seen outlined by the clear light of the full moon. A nightingale sings... [The score calls for the inclusion of birdsong, real, recorded... innovation that became prophetic].

18:27  I Pini della Via Appia
Misty dawn on the Via Appia: the solitary pines are guardians of the magical landscape; the insistent rhythm of countless footsteps can be heard. The poet has a fantastic vision of past glories: trumpets sound and, in the brightness of the new radiant sun, a consular army is gradually approaching the sacred Via, heading triumphantly towards the Capitol...

Critics have often called Respighi ultra-conservative, among other less-than-warm epithets. But audiences love it. That's what ultimately matters.

The performance is by the Slovenian ensemble, Gimnazija Kranj Symphony Orchestra, conducted by maestro Nejc Bečan.

Chopin, Ballade No 3, in A flat major

Although Chopin never confirmed the source from which he took inspiration for his four ballades, it is customary to affirm that they obey the admiration he had for the work of his friend and Polish poet Adam Mickiewicz, exiled like him in the Paris of the thirties. An enthusiastic supporter of this conjecture was Robert Schumann (dedicatee of Ballade No. 2, with no great rapture on Chopin's part, it must be said). Schumann found Mickiewicz inspirational poems for each of the ballads. For No. 3, he claimed he was inspired by the poem Undine, which tells the tragic story of a water sprite, an undine, who falls in love with a mortal.

The fact is that Chopin never had any interest in music that contained characters or told stories. But neither did he reject these suggestions outright. He simply ignored them, as flippant, perhaps. 
(As for the magical character, he would reappear in one of Ravel's most celebrated compositions in the next century, as the protagonist of the first movement of his 1908 solo piano suite Gaspard de la Nuit).

Teaching wealthy ladies
The third ballade was composed during the years 1840-41, when Chopin had been in Paris for almost ten years. The early days had not been easy. But everything changed after he met the very wealthy Rothschild family, of Jewish origin, through whom Chopin gained access to the noble and aristocratic circles of Paris. The ladies asked him for lessons. The Baroness de Rothschild was the first to enroll. Also Miss Pauline de Noailles, daughter of a prince. Ballade No. 3 is dedicated to her.

Ballade No. 3 in A flat major, opus 47
Less turbulent than the two previous ballads, the third ballad begins with a long introduction that resembles, according to scholars, a conversation, a dialogue between two lovers. It is not until minute 02:11 that the first theme appears, charming and elegant. The seven-minute piece concludes with an abbreviated version of the second theme (03:58), virtuosic but not triumphant, because the infatuation of the undine, following Schumann, has turned out to be more bitter than happy.

The performance, superb, is by the Polish maestro Krystian Zimerman.