[Smt-talk] F SHARP MAJOR & Skriabin

[Charles J. Smith]

It doesn't seem quite fair to answer this question by citing member pieces from 24-key sets, like the WTC, Chopin's Preludes (op. 28), Skriabin's Preludes (Op. 11), Alkan's Etudes, or Rakhmaninof's Preludes. (His first concerto is in F# MINOR, by the way, with just a few places where it makes a Picardy shift to the parallel major.) One might debate the last, since he apparently didn't set out to write a set of 24 Preludes, one in each key, but rather filled in the gaps in the 11 already written (Op. 3/2 and Op. 23) with the set of 13 in the remaining keys (Op. 32). But still...

One of my favourite F# major pieces, one that deserves a more prominent place in the piano repertoire than it has managed is the 1873 Impromptu by Liszt, with its curious b2-motivated harmony. But it is, unfortunately, not a well-known piece, yet.

The original post mentioned Skriabin's 4th Sonata, a citation that started me thinking again about the 5th Sonata, which is also usually cited as being in F# major, as well. But what key is it in, really? Opening key-signature implies F# major (or perhaps D# minor?), and that may suffice for cataloguers, but the actual course of the music suggests otherwise. 

It's in a kind of late-romantic distorted sonata form—actually not THAT distorted, and fairly easy to follow. (See anecdote below). After the introductory stuff, the first key-area begins in F# (a pair of statements the first beginning over a C# pedal, the second over F#), but that's essentially the last we hear of that key. The second key-area is oriented (mostly) around Bb major, with a fairly strong cadence in that key. The reprise of the 1KA stuff is abridged (only the second of the original pair is reprised), beginning in B major. And the second key-area stuff comes back in Eb major, with a strong final cadence in that key (followed by some aftershocks, echoing the introduction and cluttering up any sense of final Tonic quite drastically, though the bass is still D#!). The F#-to-A# Exposition is transposed down a 5th, as a whole, not just in part, to B-do-D#—perhaps Skriabin's version of the I-to-V exposition being transposed down to IV-to-I?

Now it can certainly be argued that the notion of global key is evaporating in this piece, which is what many history books would seem to be telling us. Yet I find the sense of directed and cumulative arrival at the end of this sonata exhilarating and satisfying. So is that an arrival at a global Tonic of Eb, or is it just the vestige of a thematically-conceived sonata-form, something that can be followed as a pattern of gestures and tunes, with no real harmonic directedness toward and through a governing tonality?

I prefer the former interpretation, but expect that many will opt for the second. So, in conclusion, I will tell a story on myself, if only to illustrate the satisfaction of getting through this strange and unwieldy piece. I got to know it, many many years ago, mostly from an LP of Sviatoslaf Richter's performance in live recital, on DG, with the audience noise left on...and what noise that was, too! A real explosion as he levitated off the keyboard for that final explosion of a D#-bassed but not-very-Tonic-like sonority. (This performance has since been released on CD, but with the audience noise digitally removed—a huge mistake, in my opinion.)

Years ago, when I was teaching at UConn, Garrick Ohlsson played this sonata on a recital in the big auditorium on campus, to which I was invited by a friend. And he played the piece magnificently, very much in Richter's league. So much so that I found myself caught up in the sonata-form rhetoric, right through to final arpeggiation, and I, being in full Richter-mode, burst out in applause.

And found myself the only person clapping in a full 2000-seat concert hall. (I guess no one else bought the arrival in Eb and the return to the opening gesture as quite so compellingly conclusive...) Now, if I'd had the courage of my musical convictions, I would have leapt to my feet, shouted "Bravo!", and applauded all the louder. But, I'm sorry to say, the first thing that occurred to me was, "Am I wrong? Did I blow it, and embarrass the friend who brought me to the concert?" (She was, needless to say, cringing in her seat; I never got another invitation.) So I faltered, and then Ohlsson stood and everyone else figured out that the piece was over, too, so the opportunity was missed.

So the point of the story is actually two-fold—illustrating my own insecurities, of course, but, more importantly the fact that this sonata is a deeply satisfying journey through a tonal landscape, with a most compelling arrival—at least to those who know it well already.

But, to return to the question that motivated this thread, is that journey and arrival in F# major? I think not...

Cheers
Charles



> 
> please, add
> 
> Sergey Rachmaninoff
> 
>  Prelude op.23, no. 1
>  Piano Concerto no. 1
> 
> Best wishes,
> 
> Ildar Khannanov
> solfeggio7 at yahoo.com
> Peabody Conservatory, Johns Hopkins University
> On Monday, May 19, 2014 7:38 AM, Stephen Jablonsky <jablonsky at optimum.net> wrote:
> 
> 
> 



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Charles J. Smith
Slee Chair of Music Theory & Director of Graduate Studies
Department of Music, 220 Baird Hall
University at Buffalo
Buffalo, NY 14260
U.S.A.
716-645-0639 [academic office]
716-645-3824 [fax]
cjsmith at buffalo.edu







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