Download MUSIC FOR THE PIANO SESSION FOUR: THE PIANO IN

MUSIC FOR THE PIANO
SESSION FOUR: THE PIANO IN VICTORIAN SOCIETY, 1830-1860
As mentioned last week, today’s class is the second of two on piano music
written by the generation of composers after Beethoven. Last week’s session
was called, “The Piano’s Golden Age,” and featured music by three composers
who tried to carry on Beethoven’s legacy, but with a fuller, more romantic
sound: Chopin, Mendelssohn, and Robert Schumann. This week’s session
features music by composers who departed more noticeably from Beethoven’s
legacy.
The cover illustration for our fourth session is a 19th century cartoon caricature
of Franz Liszt at the piano. During his early life as a traveling piano virtuoso,
List’s virtuosity and flamboyant personality led audiences to believe that he
possessed superhuman qualities. By 1842, "Lisztomania" had swept across
Europe. The reception that Liszt enjoyed as a result can be described only as
hysterical. Women fought over his silk handkerchiefs and velvet gloves, which
they ripped to shreds as souvenirs. This atmosphere was fuelled in great part
by the artist's mesmeric personality and stage presence. Many witnesses later
testified that Liszt's playing raised the mood of audiences to a level of mystical
ecstasy. People spoke of him as being possessed by demons.
In addition to this popular notoriety, Liszt was prolific composer of piano
music, much of it of unequalled technical difficulty.
NINETEENTH CENTURY PIANOS
By 1840 pianos were commonly found in middle-class and upper class
households throughout Europe and America. The piano had become not only a
widely used musical instrument but also a symbol of middle class social and
economic status. As the market for pianos in homes expanded, the design of
pianos began to conform to 19th century styles of furniture. Here are some
interesting examples.
SLIDE SHOW
THE PIANO IN VICTORIAN SOCIETY
The output of piano music continued to grow as well, and in some new and
perhaps surprising directions. It was a period in which almost all major
composers wrote a lot of music for piano – solos, duets, chamber works, and
concertos, while one composer, Chopin, wrote exclusively for the piano. So
today we are looking at the same 30-year period as last week, at some of the
newer genres and new influences on piano music in this extraordinarily
productive period.
Here are some of the questions we will explore today:

Why was so much music written for the piano?

How did music for the piano change during this period?

What new kinds of piano music were created between 1830 and 1860?

What does it sound like?
EXPANDING AUDIENCES
How were audiences changing during this period?
1. First, audiences continued to grow larger, due to the growth of the
middle class and the advent of subscription concerts
2. Second, because there were new, larger concert venues to accommodate
them,
3. Third, because more and more people who attended concerts owned
pianos themselves and were learning to play them.
Not only did these new amateur pianists wanted to play piano music they
heard at concerts; they also wanted to play their favorite orchestral pieces and
operatic arias.
To satisfy these interests, composers often arranged previously published
music for different instruments or combinations of instruments. Sometimes
they arranged piano solos for some combination instruments. And sometimes
they arranged or transcribed popular orchestral pieces or operatic arias for
piano solo.
PREVIEW: WAGNER OVERTURE TO TANNHÄUSER, 1845
A famous example of this is Franz Liszt’s transcription of the Overture to
Wagner’s opera “Tannhäuser.” Here the original orchestral piece is unchanged
– nothing has been added or deleted. The extreme technical difficulty of this
work meant that only the most advanced pianists could play it. But there were
literally thousands of transcriptions of orchestral and operatic music published
during this period, which range in difficulty from very easy to very difficult.
Here’s Wagner’s original overture, in a performance by Sir George Solti and the
Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
*PREVIEW: LISZT: TRANSCRIPTION OF WAGNER’S OVERTURE TO
TANNHÄUSER, 1849
Here is Franz Liszt’s transcription, published four years later, and still
performed throughout the world today by many leading concert pianists.
In the hands of a master composer and master pianist like Liszt, the piece is
more than a mere arrangement and becomes a wonderful piece of piano music.
This is a performance by the great Russian pianist, Yulianna Adveeva.
COMPOSERS 1830-1860
Today’s session focuses on the following composers:

The young Johannes Brahms, a conservative composer from the north
German city of Hamburg, who had the great good fortune to be
“discovered” and championed by the influential composer and music
critic, Robert Schumann. And the even greater good fortune – or was it
just pure genius? - to become one of the two or three most enduring
composers of his era.

Mikhail Glinka, the first Russian composer to be known throughout
Europe. His energetic musical style was strongly influenced by the
robust, passionate style of Beethoven.

Louis Moreau Gottschalk, a young American virtuoso pianist, composer
and showman, who toured the US and Latin America and composed
music with a distinctly “American” sound.

The Hungarian wizard Franz Liszt, not only an influential composer for
the piano but a renowned piano virtuoso known throughout Europe for
his unsurpassed virtuosity and showmanship at the keyboard, as well as
for his influential compositions. Later in his long and eventful life, Liszt
would renounce public life, take religious orders, and compose some
forward-looking pieces for the piano that sound more like music of the
20th century music than that of the 19th.

Anton Rubinstein, founder of the St. Petersburg Conservatory, another
Russian piano virtuoso who toured throughout Europe and the United
States, a leading conductor of the day, and a composer of 20 operas, six
piano concertos, and a large number of piano solos and chamber works,
none of it very well known today.
GENRES OF SOLO PIANO MUSIC
 Character Pieces (short pieces of a single mood)
 Program Works (composites of several short character pieces)
 Sonatas
 Variations
 Dances: Mazurkas, Waltzes, Nocturnes, etc.
 Arrangements and Transcriptions
MUSIC FOR SOLO PIANO, 1830-1860
*GOTTSCHALK: VARIATIONS ON “THE CARNIVAL OF VENICE,” 1850
Louis Moreau Gottschalk is the first American composer to appear in these
sessions. He was born in New Orleans of a Creole (mixed-race Afro-CubanEuropean) Mother and a Jewish Father. When it became obvious that
Gottschalk had an extraordinary talent for playing the piano, his Father took
him to France for a musical education.
As an adult Gottschalk toured the world as a concert virtuoso, and lived most
of his adult life in South America, where his racial makeup was not a problem.
He played both the standard piano repertoire of the day and a large number of
his own compositions, which reflected the musical styles of the 1830s that he
absorbed growing up in New Orleans. Many of his piano compositions are
extremely difficult technically, and most reflect the popular and folk idioms of
the early 19th century, which made them seem dated and out of the mainstream when they were written, but fresh and interesting today.
The Variations on “The Carnival of Venice” shows Gottschalk’s talent and
pianistic virtuosity for which he was famous, applied here to a popular tune of
the day.
CHAMBER MUSIC WITH PIANO, 1830-1860
*BRAHMS: PIANO TRIO NO. 1, 1854
This piece illustrates the introspective, romantic qualities of the young Brahms,
long, dramatic melodies, rich-sounding harmonies, and virtuosic writing for all
three instruments.
CONCERTED MUSIC WITH PIANO, 1830-160
*LISZT: PIANO CONCERTO NO. 2, 1840-1850
Liszt wrote his second piano concerto to show off his almost super-human
virtuosity, and toured Europe with it as the backbone of his repertoire. Like his
first piano concerto, it deviates from the sonata form based on contrasting
melodies. It also deviates from the conventional three-movement form, in that it
has a single movement made up of six contrasting sections. Like Liszt’s other
music, it shows off every kind of extreme contrast in dynamics, tempo and
texture, of which the piano is capable.
To illustrate the changes in musical style in the generation after Beethoven,
let’s compare and contrast two typical American houses of the 19th century,
CLASSICAL HOUSE
If you were to describe the form of this classical-era house (let’s call it a Mozart
house) you would probably say that it is white, symmetrical, balanced, and in
good proportions. The overall effect is serene – all the features of this house
blend together into a restful overall image. No single feature of the house
stands out, or overpowers, or conflicts for your attention with other features.
“A place for everything, and everything in its place” would be a good summary.
ROMANTIC HOUSE
If you were to describe the form of this romantic-era house (let’s call it a Franz
Liszt house) you would probably say that it is colorful, asymmetrical, dynamic,
and full of interesting features that do not blend together but compete for your
attention as your eyes move from one place to another. “A wealth of colorful,
inventive details” would be a good summary.
This performance is by the wonderful Russian pianist, Mikhail Pletnev, sadly
not heard much in the United States.