Day 252: Piano Variations III, Piano Sonatas Wo047, Misc. Piano Works I

BeethovenCD57Two pianists perform on today’s CD: Alfred Brendel and Ulrich Staerk.

I’ve been listening to Alfred for a week or two. He’s fantastic.

I’m not familiar with Ulrich Staerk. So I’ll have to Google him.

According to the Naxos web site (Naxos is another excellent Classical music label),

Ulrich Stærk has been a much sought-after concert pianist in Denmark since his debut in Copenhagen in 1989, and has a wide-ranging career on the Continent with concerts in cities like Paris, Vienna and London. He has worked with artists like Yo-Yo Ma, Barbara Frittoli, Inga Nielsen and the Rubinstein Quartet, and has been a soloist with several orchestras; among these we can mention the Schleswig-Holstein Symphony Orchestra, the Danish National Symphony Orchestra/DR, the Tivoli Symphony Orchestra and the regional orchestras in Århus and North Slesvig in piano concertos by Chopin, Mozart, Ravel, Bartók, Shostakovich, de Falla, Beethoven, Grieg, Gershwin and Czerny.

That doesn’t tell me how old he is. But it tells me he’s accomplished.

Tracks 1-9 (Alfred) were recorded between 1961 and 1964. They are:

6 Easy Variations in F Wo064 on a Swiss Air

9 Variations in A Wo069 on Paisello’s Air “Quant’e piu bello”

6 Variations in G Wo077 on an Original Theme

8 Variations in C Wo072 on Gretry’s Air “Un fievre brulante”

Rondo in G Op. 51 No. 2

Allegretto in C Minor Wo053

6 Ecossaises Wo083

Bagatelle in A Minor Wo059 “Fure Elise”

Polonaise in C Op. 89

Tracks 10-15 (Ulrich) were recorded in 2007. They are:

Piano Sonata in E Flat Wo047 No. 1
I
II
III

Piano Sonata in F Minor Wo047 No. 2
I
II
III

The incomparable “Fur Elise” is on this CD. I consider it one of the most beautiful melodies ever created.

Overall, I prefer Alfred Brendel over Ulrich Staerk. But both are superb pianists.

By the way, there are a lot of terms and titles on today’s CD, including:

Ecossaises, which is,

Écossaise (in French: Scottish) is a type of contra dance in a Scottish style that was popular in France and Great Britain at the end of the 18th century and at the beginning of the 19th. The écossaise was usually danced in 2/4 time.

Bagatelle, which is,

A bagatelle is a short piece of music, typically for the piano, and usually of a light, mellow character. The name bagatelle literally means a “a short unpretentious instrumental composition” as a reference to the light style of a piece (Oxford English Dictionary 2001; Kennedy and Kennedy 2007). Although bagatelles are generally written for solo piano, they have also been written for piano four hands, harpsichord, harp, organ, classical guitar, vibraphone, unaccompanied oboe, clarinet, violin, viola, various chamber-music configurations, orchestra, band, voice and piano, and a capella choir.

The best-known bagatelles are probably those by Ludwig van Beethoven, who published three sets, Opp. 33, 119 and 126, and wrote a number of similar works that were unpublished in his lifetime including the piece that is popularly known as Für Elise.

Polonaise, which is,

The polonaise (Polish: polonez) is a dance of Polish origin, in 3/4 time. Its name is French for “Polish.”

The polonaise had a rhythm quite close to that of the Swedish semiquaver or sixteenth-note polska, and the two dances have a common origin.

Polonaise is a widespread dance in carnival parties. Polonaise is always a first dance at a studniówka (“hundred-days”), the Polish equivalent of the senior prom that occurs approximately 100 days before exams.

By the way, there’s a bit of history behind the song Fur Elise. According to Wikipedia,

Bagatelle No. 25 in A minor (WoO 59 and Bia 515) for solo piano, commonly known as “Für Elise” or “Fuer Elise” (German: [fyːʁ eːˈliːzə], English: “For Elise”, commonly misspelled “Fur Elise”), is one of Ludwig van Beethoven’s most popular compositions. It is usually classified as a bagatelle, but it is also sometimes referred to as an Albumblatt.

The score was not published until 1867, 40 years after the composer’s death in 1827. The discoverer of the piece, Ludwig Nohl, affirmed that the original autographed manuscript, now lost, was dated 27 April 1810.[4]

The version of “Für Elise” we hear today is an earlier version that was transcribed by Ludwig Nohl. There is a later version, with drastic changes to the accompaniment which was transcribed from a later manuscript by Barry Cooper.

It is not certain who “Elise” was. Max Unger suggested that Ludwig Nohl may have transcribed the title incorrectly and the original work may have been named “Für Therese”, a reference to Therese Malfatti von Rohrenbach zu Dezza (1792–1851). She was a friend and student of Beethoven’s to whom he proposed in 1810, though she turned him down to marry the Austrian nobleman and state official Wilhelm von Droßdik in 1816.

According to a 2010 study by Klaus Martin Kopitz (de), there is evidence that the piece was written for the German soprano singer Elisabeth Röckel (1793–1883), later the wife of Johann Nepomuk Hummel. “Elise”, as she was called by a parish priest (she called herself “Betty” too), had been a friend of Beethoven’s since 1808.

And there you have it. One of the most beautiful pieces of Classical music I can imagine…and nobody really knows who Elise was. Maybe not knowing only adds to the melancholy of the composition.

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