2nd piano concerto (Bartók)

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Béla Bartók's Piano Concerto No. 2 in G major , Sz. 95, BB 101 (1930–1931) is considered to be one of the most difficult works in piano literature. Although Bartók completed the composition of the second concert in October 1931, it was not premiered until January 23, 1933 in Frankfurt am Main under the baton of Hans Rosbaud with Bartók as the soloist - a remarkable event, as this was Bartók's last appearance in Germany was soon completely dominated by the National Socialists .

Musically, the work is in the tradition of neoclassicism . Stravinsky's influence is particularly noticeable in the instrumentation of the first movement and is reminiscent of Petrushka . Bartók's Second Piano Concerto is rhythmically so subtly accented that it is also accessible to listeners of other musical genres.

Emergence

Bartók had already realized in his first piano concerto that it was “ a little difficult - you could even say very difficult! - both for the orchestra and for the audience ” . He tried to counter this problem in the second piano concerto; As he writes in the program booklet for the world premiere, the second piano concerto is conceived " with fewer difficulties for the orchestra and more courtesy in its thematic material ". Since Bartók wrote much of his piano music for personal use as a soloist in Europe and the United States, it seems natural that he wanted his work to reach a wider audience.

Despite all the rhythmic finesse, the counterpoint used makes the second piano concerto a demanding work.

shape

Bartók's 2nd piano concerto follows the classic three-movement form. The form of the second concerto is symmetrical, the tempo markings are fast - slow - fast - slow - fast . The first movement ( Allegro ) follows the main sonata form and begins with a piano solo. A trumpet belts out a quote from Stravinsky's ballet The Firebird in between, which becomes one of the two main themes. This gives the sentence a slightly humorous character. Bartók completely dispenses with the strings in the first movement, so that the wind instruments and percussionists enter into a dialogue with the piano.

I. Allegro

The piano is only accompanied by wind and percussion instruments. This increases the energy and the coarseness of the sound, with the brass instruments , which are concentrated polyphonically, playing an important role.

The development of the first movement does not follow the scheme of the classical sonata form, but rather forms an uninterrupted motivic evolution of the main theme. In a certain sense this is reminiscent of the Concerts for Keyboard Instrument and Orchestra by Johann Sebastian Bach .

The theme introduced by the trumpet at the beginning is relatively simple and concise, based on an incomplete diatonic with pentatonic steps. The rhythmic and tonal shape of this theme anticipates the whole character of the first movement and its clear, cheerful coloring. The piano answers this with a phrase in the rhythm of the Verbunkos , Hungarian dances, which is also mostly diatonic. The pianistic style of the movement is also determined by the densely saturated, but in the course of the course logical harmony with recumbent tones and seconds.

II. Adagio - Presto - Adagio

The general character of the second movement is similar to the second of Bartók's 4th String Quartet . Here, too, both sound and movement play an important role. Melodic motifs rarely appear. Again and again, the chromatic runs of both hands stop at the repetition of the same sound, which changes their timbre . At the beginning they run in parallel octaves , later in two layers of large seconds progressing in parallel and then in parallel sixths, both large and small. The character of the movement is completed by chromatic sequences of staccatos of the wind instruments and drum rolls.

The strings are introduced for the first time and they begin to have a dialogue with the piano and percussion instruments. The sections of the strings are based on two layers of parallel fifths chords , together they result in multiple sounds that also come from the fifth row. These chords are the basis for the diatonic melody, which contains whole-tone and also chromatic steps. These sections of the strings are contrasted by the serious melody of the piano with timpani. At the beginning only the last tones of the phrases extend beyond the diatonic, which suddenly form tonal turns, later the whole phrase is encompassed by the chromatic and the scale is filled with semitones. The second use of the piano then brings an ascending phase that comes to a head in repetitions of octaves that sound like bells .

In the Adagio, the piano is mainly accompanied by calmly flowing strings. In the middle part of this movement, Bartók also uses clusters in the piano part (“grapes of clay” as introduced by Henry Cowell (1897-1965)), which gives Presto a mysterious, eerie character. Bartók himself described this section as “ a scherzo built into an adagio ”.

III. Allegro molto

The last movement of the concert - it is energetic and very brilliant - is, according to Bartók, a " rondo , where only the execution follows the rondo pattern ". In passages, the movement anticipates the Concerto for Orchestra composed in 1943 . The theme, which is played on the piano with both hands at octave intervals, is rhythmically sharply drawn and moves in a section consisting of three tones of the diatonic scale. Then it suddenly turns to opposite polarity distant sounds. After repeating this theme twice in a modified form, a melody from the first movement sounds again, this time played in octaves and in a triplet rhythm. The recurring theme of the finale is a developed diatonic melody, based on the scale `` bc-des-es-fes-g-a ''. The ending of the finale is similar to that of the first movement.

Discography, some recordings

literature

  • Alfred Baumgartner: Music of the 20th Century . Kiesel Verlag 1985, p. 220
  • Tadeusz A. Zieliński: Bartók . Atlantis Verlag Zurich and Freiburg i. Br. P. 282ff.

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