VIDEO: Piano Sonata No. 3

[lateromantic]

My Piano Sonata No. 3 in F Major is an ambitious and demanding composition which I originally wrote in 1987, revised extensively in 2016, and finally got around to recording earlier this year.  This sonata is a stirring work, full of passionate Romanticism and dynamic energy and challenging the limits of the instrument.  It is nominally divided into three movements, but a unified sonata-allegro form extends across the whole composition, in which the exposition comprises the first two movements, and the final movement then develops and recapitulates the materials from the previous two movements.  All the themes are woven together contrapuntally in the coda of the last movement.

The tonal structure also extends across the whole composition, and as a consequence only the middle (slow) movement starts and ends in the same key.  The piece is meant to be played as a whole, although the second movement is also quite effective when played independently.  (The second movement is also the easiest technically.)

I also created this alternative version of the video, which follows along with the score.  (I just uploaded this video this morning, which is why I waited until today to post the sonata here.)

Unfortunately, I am unable to attach the .mp3 because it exceeds the forum's 50MB limit.  But I look forward to your comments!

[georgey]

I listened to the first 10 minutes or so 1 time.  I did give it a thumbs up. It would take several listens of the entire work as well as a little analysis of the music for me to comment in a more worthwhile way. 

I hope you don't my honest thoughts.  Here is a problem for me that I see off the top:  The texture of the music is not varied.  The bass plays steady triplets or duples for almost the entire 10 minutes, while the top is in 2 voices style or chordal.  This work seems to need more changes in texture.  I did enjoy what I heard though and the harmonic vocabulary is in a very pleasant late romantic style.

Ted wrote a piece that lasts only 2.5 minutes and is in the late romantic style (re-posted here a couple days ago by me).  I would be interested in your thoughts on this composition if you have time.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Having listened to it once in its entirety, I largely agree with georgey. There are some really nice and effective harmonic moments, but the lh has the effect of largely amounting to a continual ostinato, mostly in triplets, but not essentially different when it goes into duplets. The 3 v 2 effect of lh and rh begins as motivic but probably ends up as overdone and a bit "samey". I think you could do with more textural variety tbh (in both hands, but particularly the lh), not least in order to enhance dramatic affect.

I don't like to sound overly negative, because it seems well constructed and with good moments: I'm trying to address why I feel it comes across to me as making the same points in the same way. And I fully appreciate how much work goes into creating pieces of this size.

[lateromantic]

I would like to thank both of you for taking the time to listen to this rather lengthy composition.  I'm not sure just how to respond to the rest of it.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

I'll pose a question; I don't feel you're in any way required to answer, but my reason for asking is to hopefully stimulate thought or debate.

Unless I'm mistaken, your lh writing is primarily accompanimental, and possibly secondarily motivic. Is there a specific compositional reason why you have used multiple iterations of very similar passages, largely in the same register, albeit varying between mostly triplets but sometimes duplets, for so much of the writing? For example, obviously we know Beethoven used triplets all the way through the first movement of the Moonlight, but I presume he used the same figure constantly because he was deliberately representing a still, constant backdrop to the melody. I think what you are trying to portray is more dynamic and a more varied canvas, thus I would be using more variety of textures. Obviously this is just my opinion as a pianist/composer, and apologies if I'm not expressing myself as clearly as I'd like, but in my world view this is an pertinent aspect of compositional symbolism.

[georgey]

Moonlight sonata is a great example.  Typically works using mostly a single texture are limited to smaller pieces.  Example – first prelude Bach WTC book 1 or first of Chopin preludes op 28.  Moonlight sonata first mvt lasts maybe full 6 minutes if tempo is slow.  I thought that maybe Lateromantic maybe was going for a hypnotic effect.  But to have same texture for a 21 minute composition is too much for my taste. (I still only listened to 1st 10 minutes so I am relying on Ronde’s listen and comments.)  In a Romantic sonata, I am unable to think of a 3 mvt work done in mostly a single texture.  Sometimes I feel Medtner (example his piano sonata night wind) does not vary texture enough.  But I may only hear 2-3 minutes of a single texture before the texture changes, and sometimes dramatically.  Maybe portions of Brahms 3 piano sonatas (all very early works) also did not vary texture as well as it could. 

EDIT:  For example, portions of the 3rd and 4th mvts of Brahms piano sonata op 1 have similar texture, but I still greatly enjoy this sonata and his op. 5 (3rd) piano sonata.

[georgey]

I’m going to come to Lateromantic’s defense. Unless told otherwise, I would assume he was going for a hypnotic effect in choosing to not vary the texture.  Much like Beethoven chose the hypnotic texture of the first movement of the Moonlight sonata.  Even though there may be no precedent for a largely single texture, 3 movement romantic sonata, there is no need for such a precedent.  The form of the sonata (exposition in 1st 2 mvts with devel and recap in 3rd mvt) may also be unprecedented.  Maybe Liszt piano sonata might serve as rough model?  Not sure.  So, it then comes down to personal taste.  My guess is many people will find this work to be appealing in part due to this hypnotic effect. 

Now I come to Ronde’s and my defense.  Lateromantic said he looks forward to comments.  I believe our comments and questions were made in good faith and are appropriate.  Ronde has made 3 very fine CD’s that I own. The 3rd CD includes a fine 3 movement romantic concerto for piano that Ronde wrote.  It was posted for single piano reduction a while back in the audition room and lasts over 20 minutes.

[ronde_des_sylphes]

I should probably add to this that perhaps I've been overly harsh in focussing on what I consider compositional detriments at the expense of somewhat taking for granted the fact that the OP has managed the not inconsiderable feat of producing a coherent large-scale work.

[lateromantic]

Georgey and ronde_des_sylphes, I appreciate your comments, and they deserve a detailed and thoughtful response, which I will try to provide here by tomorrow. 

[ted]

Magnificent Robert, you are certainly a mighty creator of moments of exquisitely poignant lyricism. We have previously discussed in detail the aesthetic significance of these relative to each of us so I shan't go into that. Structure neither interests nor concerns me so I shall leave that to the others to analyse. You have more than a touch of the real stuff in you and I hope you are given some serious attention by musicians and pianists.

[lateromantic]

Georgey and ronde_des_sylphes:

My apologies for replying so late here.

Ronde_des_sylphes described my LH writing as "primarily accompanimental," and both of you have referred to what you perceive as a lack of textural variation. 

I would agree that much of the LH is accompanimental, but there are also significant places where the left hand presents a countermelody, or where the primary melody is at least partially in the left hand.  And even in places where the LH has straight triplets or (in the last movement) straight sixteenths, its character is not always what I would think of as purely accompanimental.

Let me review movement by movement how I would describe the textures and rhythms, especially with regard to the left-hand part.   (The bar numbers below can be compared against the score video I posted above.)

(1)  First Movement. 

The left-hand flow is primarily straight triplets.  But the driving rhythm of the agitated staccato triplets in the introductory and closing parts of the movement are significantly different in character from the arpeggiated figures in the central bars 37-82.  I don't think of the agitato triplets in the outer sections as as pure accompaniment, but rather as a motivic idea that is set in contrast to the right hand.  Notice at the end of the movement how they convey a sense of restlessness and disquiet, even as the dynamic retreats to a triple piano.

The triplet arpeggios in the center of the movement, in contrast, should blend into the background so that the listener is only vaguely aware of them as triplets. (Perhaps I didn't achieve that sufficiently in my performance?)  In bb. 37-55 (first theme), only the lowest line of the LH should be brought out, which sets up a counterpoint to the main right-hand melody.  Starting at bar 56, however, most of the emphasis should go to the LH's top notes, which provide a secondary voice in the tenor range.  In the score, I use stem direction in both cases to emphasize the linear melodic movements in the LH.   Later, starting in bar 72, the main melody is shared between the hands, while the right hand provides commentary in a higher register.

(2) Second Movement.

The question was raised whether or not I was trying to achieve a "hypnotic effect" akin to the first movement of the Moonlight.  The outer movements of this sonata in my opinion present much too much variation in tempo, dynamic, and mood to create such an effect.  But to some extent I think that idea does apply to the middle movement, and my experience performing this movement by itself is that it does seem to put the listeners into a kind of trance.  (In fact, I think some of them used that word.)

The first 14 bars are a bridge from the previous movement, weaving motives from the movement just finished with the one just ahead.  And yes, it is against a backdrop of continuous triplets.

At bar 15, with the arrival at E major, there is a dramatic change.  The tempo is much slower, and the background becomes duple divisions instead of triplets; the two changes together convey a feeling of solemnity and serenity.  The LH is most accompanimental, except for some secondary lines that are woven in.  At bar 27 the backdrop changes to triplets to produce a feel of "opening up."

In bb. 39-53, the LH has an important melody of its own, in counterpoint to the treble melody.

Bars 63-76, written in three staves, present what I think is perhaps the most unusual texture in the whole sonata.  The main melody is presented in octaves in a very high register, an imitative line (mostly in the LH) is presented in the piano's middle register, and the LH provides the bass line and triplet backdrop.  Note the unusually wide separation between the two imitative lines.

(3)  Third Movement.

The opening of the third movement (bb. 1-18) is very different.  This section has an improvisatory feel, alternating between slow contrapuntal movement between the two hands vs. mostly-RH arpeggiations against melodic fragments in the LH.  At bar 19 the slower-moving melody passes from the LH to the RH, while the LH takes on a new rhythmic pattern, an energetic staccato sixteenth-note pulse that is clearly more than just backdrop.  The pattern is related to the agitato triplets from the first movement, and in fact develops into them at bar 45, at which point a long build toward the recapitulation begins.

The order of themes in the recap is shuffled, with the second theme coming first at the Grandioso climax (bar 102).  The rhythm here is not triplets but surging 32nds.  As we recede from the climax, the 32nds give way first to hextuplets (bar 106) and then to sixteenths (bar 110).  The LH again has dual roles here, providing accompanimental backdrop but also sharing in melodic lines.

The closing theme from the first movement reappears at b. 122, including its agitato triplet motive in the LH.

After a dramatic pause, the principal theme from the first movement arrives (belatedly) at bar 154.  As in the first movement, the LH has arpeggiated triplets along with linear melodic motions indicated by stem direction in the score.

The beginning point of the Coda is somewhat ambiguous, but I consider it to be the Maestoso at bar 171.  Here two melodies from the second movement are presented in the two hands.  Starting at bar 179, the LH presents a march-like version of the principal theme against a second-movement theme in the RH.

In the concluding section (b. 194 to the end), the accompanimental texture is straight sixteenths and later sixteenth-note hextuplets, but presented in a very low register with the pedal, so that it should be heard only as a kind of impressionistic harmonic haze where the individual notes can scarcely be heard at all.  If I were to orchestrate the movement (and yes, I was thinking orchestrally when I wrote it), I would probably use long continuous notes instead.  Of special interest is the counterpoint between the first theme (RH) and the second theme (LH) in bb. 198-205.

- - -

To summarize, I do make a great deal of use of triplet rhythms in this sonata, but certainly not exclusively so.  Even with regard to the triplets, I see an important distinction between the use of quiet accompanimental arpeggiated triplets vs. dynamic rhythmic patterns that are motivically significant but which happen to be in triplets.

By the way, georgey mentions the Liszt B minor sonata.  That sonata is in a single movement, even if somewhat episodic, whereas I am also exploiting the breaks between the movements in my own work.  So I see this one as rather different.  But the Liszt sonata did serve as a significant influence on my second sonata and especially my fourth.

[lateromantic]

Magnificent Robert, you are certainly a mighty creator of moments of exquisitely poignant lyricism. We have previously discussed in detail the aesthetic significance of these relative to each of us so I shan't go into that. Structure neither interests nor concerns me so I shall leave that to the others to analyse. You have more than a touch of the real stuff in you and I hope you are given some serious attention by musicians and pianists.

Thanks, Ted, I appreciate your comments.  And yes, I do remember our discussion about the meaning of Romanticism.  By the way, I was enjoying your lively Call of the Hundred Islands a little while ago and left my comments there.

[georgey]

Lateromantic,

Thank you for the detailed, thoughtful explanation.  I did listen to the entire 24-minute sonata just now.  I enjoyed hearing this.  As mentioned before, I did give it a thumbs up. I should also say that I find your performance as well as the quality of the sound recording to be very good.  There are many very appealing aspects to this work!

Your prior post does a nice job in explaining why you feel that lack of texture changes is not an issue with this piece.  But I hope you don’t mind if I say that I continue to find that the work would be more enjoyable for me if it had even more changes in texture than the agitated staccato triplets in opening and closing of the 1st mvt and the beginning of the 3rd movement (which I consider as welcome changes in texture).  I need to emphasize: Texture is just one of many elements in music.  I am sure that you will have many followers that are very happy with all elements of this work.    Also, expressed here are just my personal feelings.

Also, thank you for listening to Ted’s composition!  Your comments are spot on I feel. As far as an example of an extended Romantic work for piano (of similar length but of a different character compared to yours), I would HIGHLY recommend listening to Ronde’s concerto (if you have time).   

[ronde_des_sylphes]

Lateromantic, thank you for the detailed info on your compositional process, etc. I'll have a listen later tonight and post my thoughts.

[lateromantic]

Lateromantic,

Thank you for the detailed, thoughtful explanation.  I did listen to the entire 24-minute sonata just now.  I enjoyed hearing this.  As mentioned before, I did give it a thumbs up. I should also say that I find your performance as well as the quality of the sound recording to be very good.  There are many very appealing aspects to this work!

Your prior post does a nice job in explaining why you feel that lack of texture changes is not an issue with this piece.  But I hope you don’t mind if I say that I continue to find that the work would be more enjoyable for me if it had even more changes in texture than the agitated staccato triplets in opening and closing of the 1st mvt and the beginning of the 3rd movement (which I consider as welcome changes in texture).  I need to emphasize: Texture is just one of many elements in music.  I am sure that you will have many followers that are very happy with all elements of this work.    Also, expressed here are just my personal feelings.

Also, thank you for listening to Ted’s composition!  Your comments are spot on I feel. As far as an example of an extended Romantic work for piano (of similar length but of a different character compared to yours), I would HIGHLY recommend listening to Ronde’s concerto (if you have time).   

I appreciate your comments, georgey.  In order to improve in just about any field of human endeavor, one needs to be able to receive feedback on what one is doing and to learn from that feedback, and composing is in my opinion no exception.  I will try to weigh in your observations regarding the nature of textural variation (especially as it reflects rhythmic flow) in my future composing efforts.

I'll also check out ronde_des_sylphes's concerto. 

[ronde_des_sylphes]

After a relisten along with the notes, I feel I got more out of it second time round. Perhaps my feeling would be that the triplets serve a clear structurally unifying purpose? Hard to put into words, but I suspect we probably have a similar, but different, attitude in feeling that there should be a factor which contributes to overall cohesion in pieces of larger dimensions, but my aesthetic is to have melodic motifs [and mutated versions thereof] as the predominant angle through which that is attained whereas here you've chosen a rhythmic quasi-ostinato [and related versions] as the mechanism. Anyway, thank you for the evident care and effort you have put into both the notes and the composition.

[georgey]

I appreciate your comments, georgey.  In order to improve in just about any field of human endeavor, one needs to be able to receive feedback on what one is doing and to learn from that feedback, and composing is in my opinion no exception.  I will try to weigh in your observations regarding the nature of textural variation (especially as it reflects rhythmic flow) in my future composing efforts.

I'll also check out ronde_des_sylphes's concerto. 

Having an open mind is a very admirable asset.  We ALL can learn from others. However, the most important thing is that you are happy with your work.  So far you have done very well with composing and others have shown their admiration of your work.  If you are able to make use of observations of others on texture or other items in a way that YOU are happy with, then great!  Good luck with your future projects.   

[lateromantic]

After a relisten along with the notes, I feel I got more out of it second time round. Perhaps my feeling would be that the triplets serve a clear structurally unifying purpose? Hard to put into words, but I suspect we probably have a similar, but different, attitude in feeling that there should be a factor which contributes to overall cohesion in pieces of larger dimensions, but my aesthetic is to have melodic motifs [and mutated versions thereof] as the predominant angle through which that is attained whereas here you've chosen a rhythmic quasi-ostinato [and related versions] as the mechanism. Anyway, thank you for the evident care and effort you have put into both the notes and the composition.

Yes cohesion is a consideration here too.  I am not comfortable with the idea of flitting semi-randomly among textures or styles within a composition.  Trying to achieve the variety necessary to avoid monotony, while at the same time producing a cohesive work, is one of the chief challenges of composition, especially when one is creating a larger-scale work like this one.

[lateromantic]

Having an open mind is a very admirable asset.  We ALL can learn from others. However, the most important thing is that you are happy with your work.  So far you have done very well with composing and others have shown their admiration of your work.  If you are able to make use of observations of others on texture or other items in a way that YOU are happy with, then great!  Good luck with your future projects.   

Thanks, and again, thanks to both of you for your observations.