SO, WHERE NEXT…?
We suggest works to explore after Rachmaninov’s Paganini Rhapsody
Paganini 24 Caprices for Solo Violin
You’ve enjoyed the variations, now turn to the original. Perhaps the best way to truly appreciate the wit and ingenuity of Rachmaninov’s Paganini
Rhapsody is to explore the work on which it’s based. Of the two-dozen caprices for solo violin that Paganini wrote from 1802-17, No. 24 is arguably the most complex – with double and triple stops aplenty, not to mention parallel octave runs and lefthand pizzicatos, it tests the violinist’s technique to the very nth degree. The preceding 23 are, of course, no gentle stroll in the park either, but Paganini’s gift for melody ensures they never dull the listener’s senses as simply a display of violin showmanship. Recommended recording: Julia Fischer (violin) Decca 478 2408
Rachmaninov Variations on a Theme of Chopin
Paganini wasn’t the only composer who inspired Rachmaninov to write variations. The Russian also penned sets on themes by Corelli and Chopin; his 1903 Variations on a Theme of Chopin was his first large-scale solo piano work. Its grave nine-bar theme is the C minor Largo Prelude from Chopin’s Preludes, Op. 28, from which the composer spins 22 continuous variations. Over the piece’s mighty span, Rachmaninov explores a variety of textures – from the Nocturne-like sixth variation to the fugal ninth – culminating in a majestic final variation. He also tests out techniques that reappear in the Paganini Rhapsody: grouping variations to suggest the movements of a sonata or concerto and playing with their length to create a sense of journey. Recommended recording: BIS BIS-SACD-1518
Lutos√awski Variations on a Theme by Paganini
Written in 1941 and premiered in the same year by the composer and fellow Pole Andrzej Panufnik at the Aria café in occupied Warsaw, Lutos√awski’s brief, demonic set of variations for two pianos packs a violent, angry punch from the word go. There are homages to Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody throughout in the piano figurations and harmonies, along with nods to jazz. And is Lutos√awski hinting darkly at the horrors of Jewish deportations with his locomotive-like accompaniments in the first piano part of the eighth variation? There are moment of stark beauty, too – oases within the madness. The ending, in which D major is juxtaposed with the A minor home key, is suitably defiant. Recommended recording: Martha Argerich, Nelson Freire (pianos) Philips 411 0342
Franck Symphonic Variations for piano and orchestra
Franck’s Symphonic Variations may predate Rachmaninov’s Paganini Rhapsody by nearly 50 years, but it is not a million miles away in character. Premiered at Paris’s Société Nationale de Musique in 1886, it wasn’t, alas, until after Franck died four years later that it gained popularity. A foreboding opening in the strings hints at dark times ahead, but the mood is lightened by the entry of the piano. After that, we shift effortlessly between dreamy reflection and buoyant bonhomie as one variation connects seamlessly with the next – so well does Franck interweave them that there is debate over how many variations we actually hear. The theme, incidentally, is his own. Recommended recording: Jean-yves Thibaudet (piano); L’orchestre de la Suisse Romande/charles Dutoit Decca 475 8764
Schmidt Concertante Variations on a Theme of Beethoven
Like Rachmaninov, Franz Schmidt turned to a tune from the early 19th century for his set of variations for piano and orchestra – namely the opening of the Scherzo of Beethoven’s ‘Spring’ Violin Sonata No. 5. The Austrian gives little of inkling of the joys of spring in the opening of his 1923 work, though, keeping the tune relatively disguised in a lushly scored, rippling first variation that, if anything, hints at melancholy. It is only in the second variation that the theme is revealed for what it is.
It’s a charming work, and if the piano part sounds a little less virtuosic than Rachmaninov’s, there’s a reason – it is written for the pianist’s left hand alone. Recommended recording: Markus Becker (piano); NDR Radiophilharmonie/eiji Oue CPO 777 3382
Mathieu Rhapsodie romantique
André Mathieu, a child prodigy dubbed
‘the Canadian Mozart’ by Parisian society, was a composition student of Honegger before homesickness and financial woes led to his return to Montreal. There he succumbed to alcoholism and died at just
39. Listening to his exuberant and ebullient 1958 Rhapsodie romantique – a work that is itself an arrangement of the second movement of a now lost Fourth Piano Concerto – it is hard to believe he was at this time in a period of turmoil. Searing energy and extreme virtuosity run throughout its broad 23-minute sweep, and the lush Romantic orchestral scoring is a direct nod to Rachmaninov, a composer for whom Mathieu had a deep admiration. Recommended recording: Alain Lefèvre (piano); Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal/matthias Bamert Analekta AN 2 9277