Chopin Prelude 28/20 question

[orlandopiano]

I've been teaching this piece for years now, and I still have not been able to give a definative answer to my students on what the chord in m.3 beat 4 is. Is it C major or C minor? I've seen both in different editions, and I've heard both on different recordings. Is there any way to know for sure?

[dnephi]

E natural.  All knowing ears will be cocked to know whether you play correctly e natural or the erroneous e-flat. (Paraphrased from Ernest Hutcheson)

Good luck.

[zheer]

 well if we are thinking o the same chord i believe it will sound rather strange to go from c minor to c major in the same bar, but hay what ever blows your hair back.

[desordre]

 Dear Orlando:
 It's a C-minor chord. There no possible doubt about it. Analyze the harmonic progression you have each bar, and the whole harmonic structure of the first four bars and you will notice that. In measure 3, the chord on the second beat is a C7, i.e., a secondary dominant to the subdominant degree (which follows on third beat). So, there is no connection between the function of the C chords of the second and fourth beat: one is dominant, the other is tonic.
 It becomes more clear if you make a schenkerian analysis, and notice that basically you have in the first four measures a simple progression of i - VI (- i) - V: the other chords just extend this.
 Furthermore, you have an echo of this in the second group of bars (5-8), where in the same metric point you have a c-minor chord.
 Best wishes!
 P.S.: By the way, the Urtext shows a flat on this particular e.
 

[orlandopiano]

E natural.  All knowing ears will be cocked to know whether you play correctly e natural or the erroneous e-flat. (Paraphrased from Ernest Hutcheson)

Then I guess the Paderewski edition is erroneous, as are Ivo Pogorelich, Daniel Barenboim, Adam Harasiewicz, Martha Argerich, Evgeny Kissin, Claudio Arrau, and Garrick Ohlsson to name a few.

Dear Orlando:
 It's a C-minor chord. There no possible doubt about it.
 

Alfred Cortot, Maurizio Pollini, and Artur Rubinstein (to name a few) would disagree.

For the record, I feel it should be a C minor chord, but this thread alone shows you why there is confusion about this note.

[desordre]

 (EDIT: can't stop posting...you already wrote what I would)
 Dear Orlando:
 Just for the sake of curiosity, I did listen to all my recordings of this preludes, to refresh my ears. Interesting results:
 - E natural: Rubinstein, Cortot, Pollini, Perlemuter;
 - E flat: Argerich, Lugansky, Zaritzkaya, Biret, Ashkenazy, and the orchestral version made by the composer Jean Françaix.
 So... Argerich versus Pollini ... Rubinstein versus Ashkenazy ...  
 What other versions do you know?
 Best wishes!
 

[zheer]

:
 - E natural: Rubinstein, Cortot, Pollini, Perlemuter;
 

  Cortot is my favorite Chopin player, so you can emagin that i have him playing the preludes on a CD, am 100% sure he plays a C minor chord, anyway the chord that follwows the C minor chord is Aflat, hence it has e flat and a falt within the chord, now well all know that e falt and a flat make-up the C minor scale, so going from c major to a flat is strange, can anyone provide us with a Rubenstine or pollini recording please?

[nicco]

This is quite interesting. Ive heard both versions now, and the e natural sounds very wrong to me in this type of progression. The melodic line gets totally messed up:

g - ab - g - (f - eb)
eb - f - eb - (d - c)
d - e - g - (f - e vs eb)
d - g - h - (a - g)

As you can see, all the phrases ends with a whole step, so if the f would go to e natural, it would mess up this system.

Btw what follows this chord is surely not an a-flat, but a D7 chord.

[zheer]

Btw what follows this chord is surely not an a-flat, but a D7 chord.

 We have an a flat octave followed by an a flat chord in the RH with an e flat playd with the thumb, so possibly a flat second inversion, anyway the chord that follows this is D flat. So we have C minor - Aflat major - Dflat major. Unless you have a good explenation my blood pressure is going to go up.

[nicco]

We have an a flat octave followed by an a flat chord in the RH with an e flat playd with the thumb, so possibly a flat second inversion, anyway the chord that follows this is D flat. So we have C minor - Aflat major - Dflat major. Unless you have a good explenation my blood pressure is going to go up.

For the record, the chords discussed is in the 3rd-4th measure, 4th-1st beat.

The chord you are describing is the 1st beat of the 2nd measure. Get your facts right.

[zheer]

The chord you are describing is the 1st beat of the 2nd measure. Get your facts right.

  Well you know i just had to play through prelude again, and yes further on the prelude we do have a D7 chord, and funy enough a C major chord does not sound too alien, though c minor sound more appropraite. Anyway i was about to jump of a tall building , i wont know we have the facts right.

[zheer]

 WAW, just heard the Cortot interpretation, and he plays C major, F**ck . Looking at the score we have a C mjor chord indeed. I think i will go and jump of a tall building.

[desordre]

Cortot is my favorite Chopin player, so you can emagin that i have him playing the preludes on a CD, am 100% sure he plays a C minor chord (...)
(...) can anyone provide us with a Rubenstine or pollini recording please?

WAW, just heard the Cortot interpretation, and he plays C major (...)
(...) I think i will go and jump of a tall building.

Dear Zheer:
 Don't do that! Just be more careful with your posts next time...
 By the way, do you think yet that we need a correction of Rubinstein and Pollini? 
 Best wishes!

[jre58591]

in busoni's variations on this prelide, there is an e natural written everywhere that part shows up.