Piano Sonata No. 2 (Chopin)

Piano Sonata No. 2
by Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric Chopin in 1835
Other name	Funeral March
Key	B♭ minor
Opus	Op. 35
Form	Piano sonata
Composed	1837–1839
Published	1840
Duration	About 22–26 minutes
Movements	Four

Frédéric Chopin's Piano Sonata No. 2 in B♭ minor, Op. 35, is the composer's first mature piano sonata. The work, which is in four movements, is considered to be one of the greatest piano sonatas of the literature and continues to be one of the most popular, and discussed, works of Chopin. A typical performance lasts around 22-26 minutes, depending on whether the repeat of the first movement's exposition is observed.

The work was completed in 1839 at Nohant, near Châteauroux, in France, and published the following year. The sonata's center of gravity, the third movement (Marche funèbre: Lento) is a funeral march that was written presumably two years prior to the remainder of the sonata, although theories that suggest an earlier composition date have been proposed. The sonata is especially noted for being influenced by works by Beethoven, namely his Piano Sonata No. 12 in A♭ major, Op. 26 (the third movement of which is also a funeral march) and his Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111.

Following its publication, the Piano Sonata No. 2 won instant popularity with the public, but also aroused misunderstanding among music critics. Some critics, including Robert Schumann, argued that the work suffered from structural inferiority, and that Chopin “could not quite handle sonata form”. However, recent commentaries suggest that these notions are becoming less accepted. The work has been recorded by many professional pianists and is regularly performed in concerts and classical music competitions, especially the Chopin International Piano Competition.

Historical background

The Romantic era of music was a time where the sonata lost its overpowering dominance. While the sonatas of Beethoven and Mozart comprised a considerable portion of their compositional output, this is not true of the next generation of composers: Franz Liszt only wrote two sonatas among his dozens of instrumental compositions, Robert Schumann eight (including the Fantasie in C, Op. 17), and Felix Mendelssohn thirteen. Besides the Piano Sonata No. 2, Chopin only wrote three other sonatas: a piano sonata in C minor (Op. posth. 4), written at the age of eighteen; the Piano Sonata No. 3 in B minor (Op. 58); and the Cello Sonata in G minor (Op. 65).

The compositional origins of the Piano Sonata No. 2 are centered on its third movement (Marche funèbre), a funeral march which many scholars indicate was written in 1837; Jeffrey Kallberg believes that such indications are because of an autograph manuscript of eight bars of music in D-flat major marked Lento cantabile, apparently written as a gift to an unnamed recipient. The manuscript, which is dated 28 November 1837, would later become part of the middle section of the Marche funèbre. However, Kallberg suggests this manuscript may have been intended as the beginning of an earlier attempt of a different slow movement, instead of being part of the Marche funèbre, writing that "it would have been unusual for Chopin to make a gift of a manuscript that, if it did not contain an entire piece, did not at least quote the beginning of it", as almost all of his other presentation manuscripts did. He also suggests that a four-hand arrangement by Julian Fontana of the Marche funèbre may be connected with an abandoned piano sonata for four hands that Chopin wrote in 1835, originally to be published as his op. 28 (which was instead appropriated to the 24 Preludes, Op. 28), therefore raising the possibility that the movement may actually date from 1835 instead of the generally accepted 1837.

Some time after writing the Marche funèbre, Chopin composed the other movements, completing the entire sonata by 1839. In a letter on 8 August 1839, addressed to Fontana, Chopin wrote:

I am writing here a Sonata in B flat minor which will contain my March which you already know. There is an Allegro, then a Scherzo in E flat minor, the March and a short Finale about three pages of my manuscript-paper. The left hand and the right hand gossip in unison after the March. ... My father has written to say that my old sonata [in C minor, Op. 4] has been published by [Tobias Haslinger] and that the German critics praise it. Including the ones in your hands I now have six manuscripts. I'll see the publishers damned before they get them for nothing.

Haslinger's unauthorized dissemination of Chopin's early C minor sonata (he had went as far as engraving the work and allowing it to circulate, against the composer's wishes) may have increased the pressure Chopin had to publish a piano sonata; this may explain why Chopin added the other movements to the Marche funèbre to produce a sonata. The work was published in May 1840.

Movements

The sonata comprises four movements:

1. Grave – Doppio movimento (B♭ minor – B♭ major)
2. Scherzo (E♭ minor with a trio and ending both in G♭ major)
3. Marche funèbre: Lento (B♭ minor with a trio in D♭ major)
4. Finale: Presto (B♭ minor)

I. Grave – Doppio movimento

5-7 minutes

The introduction of the first movement

The first movement is in a modified sonata form in B♭ minor and ²
₂ time. It opens with a four-bar introduction in the relative major, D♭ major marked Grave, followed by a tempo change to Doppio movimento, a key change to the tonic key, and the introduction of an agitated bass accompanimental figure; four bars later, the main theme enters. The main theme, marked agitato, is followed by a second theme, in D♭ major, which is marked piano and sostenuto. In the development, all of the themes introduced in the movement appear In the recapitulation, the principal section containing the main theme does not return, possibly inspired by the older binary sonata form typical of Domenico Scarlatti's keyboard sonatas. Instead, the lyrical second theme returns – but in the tonic's parallel major, B♭ major. The movement is closed with a brilliant 12-bar coda, marked stretto and ending in three B-flat major chords marked fff (fortississimo).

Repeat of the exposition

Breitkopf & Härtel edition edited by Johannes Brahms (1878). This edition lacks a backwards repeat sign at the Doppio movimento and therefore indicates that the repetition of the exposition should start at the Grave.

When the sonata was published in 1840 in the usual three cities of Paris, Leipzig, and London, the London and Paris editions indicated the repeat of the exposition as beginning at the very beginning of the movement (at the Grave section). However, the Leizpig edition designed the repeat as beginning at the Doppio movimento section. Although the critical edition published by Breitkopf & Härtel (that was edited, among others, by Franz Liszt, Carl Reinecke, and Johannes Brahms) indicate the repeat similarly to the London and Paris first editions, almost all 20th century editions are similar to the Leizpig edition in this regard. Charles Rosen argues that the repeat of the exposition in the manner perpetrated by the Leizpig edition is a serious error, saying it is "musically impossible" as it interrupts the D-flat major cadence (which ends the exposition) with the B-flat minor accompanimental figure. However, Leikin advocates for excluding the Grave from the repeat of the exposition, citing in part that Karol Mikuli's 1880 complete edition of Chopin contained a repeat sign after the Grave in the first movement of the Piano Sonata No. 2. Mikuli was a student of Chopin from 1844-1848 and also observed lessons Chopin gave to other students - including those where this sonata was taught - and took extensive notes.

Most commercial recordings exclude the Grave from the repetition of the exposition, including those of Vladimir Ashkenazy, Murray Perahia, Maurizio Pollini, Martha Argerich, Evgeny Kissin, and Li Yundi, among others; however, in a live recording from the Chopin International Piano Competition in 2010, Yulianna Avdeeva begins the repetition from the Grave. Other recordings, including those of Sergei Rachmaninoff, Arthur Rubinstein, Vladimir Horowitz, and Garrick Ohlsson, exclude the repetition altogether.

II. Scherzo

6-7 minutes

Opening of the Scherzo

The second movement is a scherzo in E♭ minor and ³
₄ time with no tempo indication. Anatole Leikin suggests that the absence of the tempo indication can be explained by the close similarities of this movement and the closing section of the first movement, including the prevalence of repeated octaves and chords in both movements, and the identical cadential phrases. Therefore, the absence of a tempo indication may suggest that there is no new tempo, but instead a mere change of notation (from triplets to triple metre).

The movement is in the conventional scherzo-trio-scherzo form with the trio in G♭ major. The scherzo’s explosive rhythmic and dynamic power, as well as its furious insistence on repeated chords and octaves, places it in the tradition of the scherzo movements of Beethoven. However, unlike Beethoven, whose scherzos are transformed minuets, this scherzo has many defining rhythmic characteristics that make it a transformed mazurka instead. The trio, marked Più lento, has a songlike quality to it with its simple, sensuous melody. Following the return of the scherzo is a coda that is a condensed reprise of the trio and therefore ends the work in the relative major; other works of Chopin that also end in the relative major include the Scherzo No. 2 in B♭ minor (Op. 31) and the Waltz in F minor (Op. 70. No 2).

III. Marche funèbre: Lento

The third movement begins and ends with the celebrated funeral march in B♭ minor which gives the sonata its nickname, but has a calm Lento interlude in D♭ major. Henry Wood made two orchestrations of the Funeral March. One was played at The Proms on four occasions between 1895 and 1904. On the First Night of the 1907 Proms, 17 August 1907, Wood conducted a new version he had written on learning of the death two days earlier of the renowned violinist Joseph Joachim. In 1933, Sir Edward Elgar transposed it into D minor and transcribed it for full orchestra; its first performance was at his own memorial concert the next year. It was also transcribed for large orchestra by the conductor Leopold Stokowski; this version was recorded for the first time by Matthias Bamert.

The funeral march was played at the graveside during Chopin's own burial at Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. It was also used at the state funerals of John F. Kennedy, Sir Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher and those of Soviet leaders, including Leonid Brezhnev.

Title change by Chopin

After the publication of the Piano Sonata No. 2, Chopin changed the title of the Marche funèbre to simply Marche. In addition, whenever Chopin wrote about this movement in his letters, he referred to it as a "march" instead of a "funeral march".

IV. Finale: Presto

The finale contains a whirlwind of unremitting parallel octaves, with unvarying tempo and dynamics (like the 14th prelude in E♭ minor) and not a single rest or chord until the final bars with a sudden fortissimo B♭ octave and a B♭ minor chord ending the whole piece. James Huneker, in his introduction to the American version of Mikuli edition of the Sonatas, quotes Chopin as saying, "The left hand unisono with the right hand are gossiping after the March." Anton Rubinstein is said to have remarked that the fourth movement is the "wind howling around the gravestones".

Beethoven’s influence

Chopin allegedly found much of Beethoven's music distasteful. He described Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 18 in E♭ major (Op. 31 No. 3) "vulgar", and reportedly could not stand the last movement of the Symphony No. 5 in C minor (Op. 67). Of all of the Romantic era composers, Chopin is usually regarded as the one least influenced by Beethoven. However, the piano sonatas of Beethoven, called by Hans von Bülow as the "New Testament" of piano music, could not be ignored if Chopin were to make a contribution to the genre of the piano sonata, which was already losing its dominance in the Romantic era. This sonata - the first he wrote for publication - showed that he had "come to terms" with Beethoven; the work carries influences from two of Beethoven's sonatas, mainly the Piano Sonata No. 12 in A♭ major (Op. 26), but also from Beethoven's last sonata, the Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor (Op. 111).

The Piano Sonata No. 12 of Beethoven features a Marcia funèbre as one of its movements, and was Chopin's favourite sonata; he played and taught it more than any other Beethoven sonata. The plan of Chopin's sonata - with the slow Marche funèbre movement following the scherzo - directly follows that of Beethoven's sonata. However, Chopin's first movement is written in sonata form while Beethoven's first movement is a set of variations on an original theme. Nonetheless, this did not prevent Chopin from following Beethoven's plan, and the difference in form between their sonatas is relatively insignificant.

The sonata's opening bars allude to Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 32, Op. 111, Beethoven's last.

Reception and legacy

Although the sonata was quick to gain popularity among the public, it confused the critics, who found it lacked cohesion: Robert Schumann described the work as "four of [his] maddest children under the same roof". In addition, the monophonic fourth movement of the work caused a stir among Schumann and other musicians.

The march is sampled in a number of jazz compositions, including Duke Ellington's "Black and Tan Fantasy" and Cab Calloway's "Man from Harlem".

The second movement of Erik Satie's Embryons desséchés, entitled "of an Edriophthalma", uses a variation on the Funeral March's second theme. Satie labels it, "Citation de la célèbre mazurka de SCHUBERT" ("quotation from the celebrated mazurka of Schubert"), but no such piece exists.

Canadian Musician Deadmau5 used the theme from the funeral music for his hit song Ghosts 'n' Stuff.

References

Sources

• Chopin, Frederic (2013-01-01). Ekier, Jan, ed. Sonatas, Op. 35 & 58: Chopin National Edition 10A, Vol. X (Bilingual edition ed.). PWM Edition. ISBN 9781480390782. CS1 maint: Extra text (link)
• Hedley, Arthur (1962). Selected Correspondence Of Fryderyk Chopin. Universal Digital Library. Heinemann. 
• Huneker, James (1900). Chopin: The Man and His Music. C. Scribner's Sons. 
• Jonson, George Charles Ashton (1905). A Handbook to Chopin's Works. Doubleday. 
• Kallberg, Jeffrey (2001). "Chopin's March, Chopin's Death". 19th-Century Music. 25 (1): 3–26. doi:10.1525/ncm.2001.25.1.3. JSTOR 10.1525/ncm.2001.25.1.3. 
• Karasowski, Maurycy (1879). Frederic Chopin: His Life, Letters, and Works. W. Reeves. p. 338. 
• Kelley, Edgar Stillman (1913). Chopin the Composer: His Structural Art and Its Influence on Contemporaneous Music. G. Schirmer. 
• Leikin, Anatole (2001). "Repeat with Caution: A Dilemma of the First Movement of Chopin's Sonata op. 35". The Musical Quarterly. 85 (3): 568–582. JSTOR 3600997. 
• Leikin, Anatole (1994-12-08). "The sonatas". In Samson, Jim. The Cambridge Companion to Chopin. Cambridge Companions to Music. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9781139824996. 
• Liszt, Franz (1863). Life of Chopin. Ditson. 
• Neuhaus, Heinrich (1993). The Art of Piano Playing. Kahn & Averill. ISBN 9781871082456. 
• Petty, Wayne C. (Spring 1999). "Chopin and the Ghost of Beethoven". 19th-Century Music. 22 (3): 281–299. JSTOR 746802. 
• Rosen, Charles (1995). The Romantic Generation. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. 
• Willeby, Charles (1892). Frederic François Chopin. S. Low, Marston. 

External links

• Piano Sonata No. 2: Scores at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)
• Piano Sonata No. 2 sheet music available at Musopen.com
• Recording of Sonata No.2 performed by the pianist Alberto Cobo