Frédéric Chopin (1810-1849)
Piano Sonata No.3, Op.58
Piano — Garrick Ohlsson
Connoisseur Society Recording
Piano Sonata No.3, Op.58
1. Allegro maestoso
2. Scherzo
3. Largo
4. Finale: presto non tanto
You know I always liked my walking shoes
But you can get a little too fond of the blues
You walk too far, you walk away
Hello sunshine, won't you stay?
Chopin’s injunction to relax and remain supple leads inevitably to a consideration of his own bearing at the keyboard. It was quiet, almost immobile. He avoided those overt displays of body language, so beloved of other pianists, that involved torsos swaying back and forth, with hands and arms thrown aimlessly in the air. Chopin called such actions “catching pigeons.” “—” Fryderyk Chopin / Alan Walker
The sonata format — What would you say is the most studious format in classical music, by which I mean most appropriate for getting work done? Asking that question is not the same as as advocating for the use of classical music as background ambient noise. But in as much as music and the toil of the workweek can exist in a stimulating symbiosis, the piano is often the first choice for listeners who are even only periodically interested in the genre. Within classical music, and within the incalculable multitude of piano works, I realize this week just how fitting the piano sonata is for a quiet hour or two of desk work. Compared to a compilation of études or nocturnes, wherein the main idea changes every two minutes, or the piano concerto with the orchestra’s mercurial temperament—which seeks to dominate one’s attention rather than invite a meditative state of mind—the one-track advance of the piano sonata is, I think, unmatched in creating an equilibrium between change and stability. Chopin’s Piano Sonata No.3, a bit more than the preceding No.2, is one of those infrequent instances where you can play record over and over again without exhausting your interest in it nor becoming too familiar with it.
Mention of Mozart reminds us that it was his classical restraint and coolness under fire that Chopin admired. Despite the romantic passion and emotion that sometimes burns at white heat in Chopin’s music, there is an aristocratic detachment that prevails over everything that he wrote. “—” Fryderyk Chopin / Alan Walker
Largo — That ‘aristocratic detachment’ is what I’ve been hearing, really for the first time, in this month of listening to Chopin’s piano compositions. Having arrived at the composer through the usual terminals of especially lyrical piano concertos, and rhapsodic waltzes, an emotionally reserved Chopin seems counterintuitive. Yet that ‘coolness under fire’ is unmistakable at a closer listen of these composition, these piano sonatas make that more apparent. Yet this alleged image of Chopin’s demeanour during performance, “quiet, almost immobile,” also seems counterintuitive inasmuch as the swaying and gesticulation for the sake of emphasis (like Olga Scheps’s captivating performance above) seems more appropriate to the gravitational pull of this sonata’s Largo. I prefer this No.3 to the No.2 from last week, and I think that owes largely to the Largo—though the funeral march that is instead placed as the third movement of No.2 is the more famous slow movement of Chopin’s piano sonatas. In certain instances the Largo reminds me of Chopin’s Berceuse, both of which delicately tease the dark line between languor and dolour. Unlike the incredibly verbose first movement, wherein the toggle between aristocratic/conservative and liberal/romantic moods are more apparent and interesting, the Largo’s secret lies, for me, in indelible mix of the two.
SONG OF THE WEEK: ‘Hello Sunshine’ — Bruce Springsteen
My duties: I’d carry the professor’s bags, help him transcribe any interviews he did, and serve as his driver. In exchange, he insisted on paying my expenses - hotels, incidentals – and promised that I’d have time to do some botanical research. I wasn’t happy with his paying my expenses. I make more than I can spend at Alpha Labs. Besides, he was doing me a favor, giving me an excuse to leave Toronto for a few days, a few days away from the city that was, at times, oppressive because I knew it too well. “—” Days by Moonlight / André Alexis
August has been the first month ‘back in the city’, not because I’ve been away, but because the city’s come its closest to ‘normal’ since the pandemic started. It’s an uncanny sense of newness going about errands, a pleasant but fleeting feeling. I wonder if all cities get as oppressive as Toronto can get to feeling. If you’re not making bank and you don’t have a car, the city shrinks like singed plastic wrap the moment you step out the door.
One of the many things I like about the novels of André Alexis—his Quincunx Cyle in particular—is the magic they infuse into settings that can feel oppressively familiar.They’re often set in real and fictional towns in Southern Ontario, reminders of the proximity to the natural wonders that lie just beyond the city limits. It’s hard to label this month as the first cracks of sunshine in the doom and gloom of this year so far, but it is brighter, a small world opening up again despite its risks and hazards.