Posted on by tjphilbrick · 1 Comment

Four Hands

Hello all,

Our music for this week is the Fantasia in F Minor for four hands by Franz Schubert, performed by Dutch brothers Lucas and Arthur Jussen.

The Jussen brothers provide a fantastic rendition of this well-known work. They achieved international stardom at a very young age and have since toured the world together, performing piano duos like this one to packed audiences. Legendary British conductor Sir Neville Marriner commented after conducting one of their performances: “It’s like driving a pair of BMW’s. This is not just two good pianists playing together. They sense each other’s most small, individual little bit of interpretation.”   

Fantasia in F Minor for four hands was written only a few months before Schubert died. It is one of his most complete and beautiful works. Unlike most other piano duos, which were originally composed for a larger ensemble and then adapted to the four-handed context, this duo was written specifically for two pianists.

You will hear four distinct movements. The first movement is all about lyricism. Delightfully light and airy Schubert-ian melodies grace the top line, and dense but rolling figures are featured in the bottom line. The second movement, which was inspired by Paganini’s second violin concerto (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLOciQwraZg), contains an atmosphere of virtuosic turbulence. The third movement contrasts the agitation of the second movement with a brightness and liveliness that is more of what one might expect of Schubert. The fourth movement, which has been called “the most remarkable cadence in the whole of Schubert’s work,” harkens back to Bach and uses a fugue format to recapitulate all three of the previous themes.

Enjoy!

T

Posted on by tjphilbrick

The Duet #2 – Petite Suite

Hello all,

As we continue our series on the great duets in the classical music repertoire, we turn this week to Claude Debussy’s Petite Suite, performed by Christoph Eschenbach and Lang Lang.

Petite Suite is written for one piano and four hands. Debussy premiered it himself, in collaboration with fellow French musician Jacques Durand. There are four movements (not all of which are present in this performance, unfortunately) that evenly feature both pianists.

You will notice that the piece is quite simple and not technically difficult; Debussy is reported to have intended it for an amateur piano-lesson-type audience. It is particularly interesting to note that he wrote this piece shortly after being told by his Paris Conservatory piano instructor that he should focus on composition because he would never make a good pianist.

One of the things that I find most interesting about this composition is its historically anomalous nature. Debussy was a late Romantic-era composer, closely preceded by colleagues who wrote thundering symphonies (Brahms) and soaring concerti (Tchaikovsky). It is therefore curious to experience the simplicity and – as one critic put it – “delightful plainness” of the Petite Suite.

Enjoy!

T