Leon McCawley

Leon McCawley soloist, with the Goldberg Ensemble
Pianoforte Recital by Leon McCawley

PROGRAMME

Mozart was only 18 when he wrote this delightful little Sonata, in 1774. The movement sequence harks back to early Baroque, with fully developed classical sonata form just round the corner. It is a short, simple work, full of lyricism and touches of humour.

Beethoven was a master of variation form and these six variations on an original theme were composed in 1802, the same year as the Eroica Variations. By this time Beethoven had already established himself as a leading composer as well as a virtuoso pianist, and his threatening deafness had not yet begun to hamper his concert career. These variations would give him the opportunity to shine in both capacities.

It has been claimed that this famous sonata shows affinity with some of Mozart's works in C minor, and it is true that both composers gave a special meaning to this key. However, while Mozart used it mainly to express tragic resignation, it led Beethoven to great utterances of resistance and defiance. This mood is set immediately in the opening Grave, with its feeling of frustrated striving leading to the turbulent main theme of the Allegro, only to give way to the Grave's return before the development and the coda. The Adagio is one of Beethoven's great hymn-like slow movements, whose major key is set into relief by two episodes in the minor. The Rondo theme of the finale has a kind of wistful energy with more spirited interjections in the major and a magic moment when the rondo theme itself appears in tne major. The movement ends with a wonderful flourish in a fortisssimo downward scale.

In spite of their opus number these are in fact early compositions, written in 1826 when Chopin was still in his teens and before he left Poland for Paris. They are attractive occasional pieces. The origin of the name is a mystery, as the music has nothing Scottish about it. It was a fashion at the time to write pretend-country dances for the drawing room. Beethoven also wrote a set of Ecossaises.

Chopin wrote Nocturnes throughout most of his life and they contain some of his greatest music. He took the name from John Field, the Irish composer and pianist, but he transformed the form and made it his own through his harmonic imagination and melodic genius. The first, in C sharp minor, is the more dramatic; the nocturnal element seems more ominous and disturbed. The second, in D flat, is one of Chopin's most exquisite pieces of night music.

Liszt was a restless traveller for most of his life and in his three sets of "Years of Pilgrimage" he has left sound pictures and memories from both Switzerland, in Book 1, and Italy, in Books 2 and 3. The Petrarch Sonnet was originally conceived as a song, setting one of Petrarch's love poems, and later transcribed by Liszt for piano alone. A visit to the fountains at the Villa d'Este, where he spent some of his last years, inspired Liszt to write this remarkable piece of musical impressionism, far in advance of its time and foreshadowing the music of Debussy and Ravel, particularly the latter's Jeux d'eau.

Liszt's style of composition changed radically in the latter part of his life, becoming less brilliant for its own sake and anticipating the Impressionist School of composers in his harmonic innovations. He grew increasingly interested in the national music of his own country, Hungary, and that of Spain and this Rhapsody, written in 1863, is one of the earliest successful evocations of Spain by a non-Spanish composer, pre-dating those of Lalo, Debussy and Ravel. It is a grandiose work, consisting of a set of free variations; the first part based on La Folia and the second on the Jota, in brilliant contrast.

Programme notes by Ruth Lachmann