In this Nocturne there is tension between a melody trying repeatedly to take flight and escape the confines of an accompaniment unwilling to allow it to do so. In the Berceuse the left hand is virtually unchanging throughout while the right hand weaves its somniferous magic. It is similar to the Chopin Berceuse in that the melodic and dramatic narratives of the piece work themselves out over an essentially static background.īut here the comparison ends. 27, No.The Chopin Nocturne Op27-2 is sublimely beautiful piano music. 27, performed by the late Brazilian pianist, Nelson Freire: The final bars drift away amid shimmering sixths. At moments, the melodic line breaks into thirds, suggesting an operatic duet. It’s a sensuous, continuously unfolding “song without words,” filled with vocal embellishments and delicate polyrhythms. The melancholy which pervaded the previous Nocturne is replaced by reassurance. It begins with a serene melody which floats above calm arpeggiating waves. The second Nocturne is set in enharmonic D-flat major. The final bars drift off into serene C-sharp major. Following a brief, waltzing passage, a cadenza returns us to the intimate opening theme. The turbulent più mosso middle section soars with restless, heroic passion. In the pianist’s left hand, continuous arpeggios rise and fall. The first, set in C-sharp minor, was described by the biographer, James Huneker, as “the gloomiest and grandest of Chopin’s moody canvasses.” Out of primordial open fifths emerges a wistful, wandering melody.
Heard together, the two Nocturnes take us on a dramatic journey. 27 Nocturnes represented a “new wave” of piano music. They are harmonically and dramatically audacious.
Chopin’s Nocturnes become magical and atmospheric “songs of the night.” They are bel canto arias without words, in which the piano is transformed into a singing instrument. The form originated a generation earlier with the English composer-pianist, John Field (1782-1837). The two pieces for solo piano, composed in 1836, are among twenty-one surviving Nocturnes written by Chopin. 27 Nocturnes inhabit a serene, sensuous, and melancholy dreamscape.
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