93995_Chopin_Polonaises_BL2.qxd
24/6/09
18:56
Page 2
Polonaises The polonaise was a Polish peasant dance which blossomed as the splendid ‘processional’ dance of the aristocracy and gentry in the seventeenth century. The Baroque composers, who used a multitude of dance forms, welcomed it. There are polonaise movements by J.S. Bach, Handel, Couperin and Telemann. With the classic era, different melodic shapes arose and composed polonaises began to sound, in their combination of melody and rhythm, like those Chopin must have known; for example, sections of the alla polacca finale in Beethoven’s Triple Concerto, Op.56. In Chopin’s Poland, there was a profusion of polonaise composers, including his teacher, Elsner. This was one way in which national traditions could be kept alive, in a Poland which had now been robbed of its independence. Whether written for dancing or listening, however, they remained basically the simple dance form plus instrumental ornament. It remained for Chopin’s genius to expand these germinal shapes into massive, extended dramatic forms that embodied in their very substance and texture the complex feelings of a nation striving for freedom; the desolation, brooding, protest, exultation, conflict and heroic proclamation of undefeated spirit. ANDANTE SPIANATO AND GRANDE POLONAISE IN E FLAT, OP.22 The Andante Spianato (Spianato means ‘leveled’, ‘smoothed out’) starts with a lovely melody of the kind that appear in Chopin’s Nocturnes. The Grande Polonaise, which is often played as on this recording without the perfunctory orchestral part, is the first of Chopin’s big-scale efforts in this form. Written for concert audiences, it does not attempt the inward drama of the later works, but it is a brilliantly sustained bravura piece which is full of sparkling and expressive pianistic figuration. POLONAISE IN C SHARP MINOR, OP.26 NO.1 This is Chopin’s first mature Polonaise. The opening is in bold octave leapes, affirmed by full dramatic chords. The main theme is of heroic declamatory character. The middle section introduces a lovely bel canto melody in D flat major, followed by recitativo-like phrases in the bass. The recapitulation is a strict repetition of the first section. POLONAISE IN E FLAT MINOR, OP.26 NO.2 The dark key of E flat minor sets the atmosphere of this extraordinary work. The unisono motive of the beginning is several times interupted by menacing chords, but finally erupts into a bold rush upwards. The agitato first subject is followed by a fanfare-like motive in D flat major. The middle section draws elements from the rich folklore of Poland. POLONAISE IN A MAJOR, OP.40 NO.1 This Polonaise, one of the most popular in the genre, is nicknamed ‘Military’, for obvious reasons. 2
The themes bear a relentlessly strident and heroic character, evoking a picture of a battlefield with trumpet and horn calls and dramatic drum rolls. Very untypical of Chopin, there are no lyrical or bel canto episodes. POLONAISE IN C MINOR, OP.40 NO.2 Composed in 1838-9, this is the companion piece to Op.40 No.1, the A major ‘Military’ Polonaise, the most extrovert of the ‘heroic’ polonaises, and for a long while the most poular. The C minor works is its emotional opposite. An inward, brooding work with intimations of epic tragedy, it sounds throughout its course like a volcano about to erupt. A prime example of Chopin’s special polyphony, or ‘two-voice’ writing, is the opening, with the portentously tragic and beautiful main theme announced in left-hand octaves, under a line of eight-note chords that start ostinato and gradually take on a melodic and ‘answering’ character. POLONAISE IN F SHARP MINOR, OP.44 This work, the longest of Chopin polonaises and opening and closing like the most fiery of them, is unique in that its middle section is the most lovely, poignant and tender of mazurkas. Probably this is what Chopin had in mind when calling the piece a ‘kind of fantasia.’ In it, by uniting in the one fabric the court dance and peasant dance of Poland, he seems to be speaking of the breadth of his love for his country and its people. POLONAISE IN A FLAT MAJOR, OP.53 It is a tribute to Chopin’s imperishable, ‘singing’ melodies that many of them have become over the years a kind of popular music. In such a way, to an enormous public, this mightly work has become ‘the Chopin Polonaise.’ But it takes the greatest of virtuosi to do justice to its enormous pianistic demands. After the heroic proclamatory opening, the middle section is in two sharply contrasting parts, the first evokes the flags and colour of battle, with its galloping sixteenth-note octaves in the left hand, and the second touchingly evokes the other side of battle, its losses and laments. POLONAISE-FANTAISIE IN A FLAT, OP.61 This is Chopin’s last major work. A ‘Fantasy’ can be described as a work in which ‘outerworld’ reflections are put in a frame of inner meditation, and so it is with this great work, which is a ‘fantasy about a polonaise.’ There are three polonaise themes, which are, however, so much akin that they could be variant forms of one another, and they are sometimes so meditatively introduced or developed that the polonaise rhythm melts away. After a long, brooding opening, the first of these polonaise themes takes shape, and is brilliantly developed. There is a slow middle section, Poco più lento, in B major-G minor, where a new, soft and lovely melody gives birth to the third polonaise theme ( or version), and after a two-bar return of the brooding opening, this theme returns to the opening key of the work to be developed further. It is followed by an impassioned climax built on the first polonaise theme, and a quiet, thoughtful end, but for the final ff chord. 3