Eight Études-Tableaux, Op. 33
Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943)
Ed note: From time to time, when Steinway Society – The Bay Area has a change in program, the notes intended for a concert program go unused. In our mission to share information about classical piano music, we wanted to share these notes about this Eight Etudes-Tableaux by Rachmaninoff (notes written by Taide Ding) with our blog readers.
Listen to these short, wonderful masterpieces being played by Lugansky, Ashkenazy, Sofronitsky
Composed in 1911 at Rachmaninoff’s Ivanovka estate, the Études-Tableaux Op. 33 are highly idiosyncratic explorations of pianistic textures and sonorities. Rachmaninoff regarded these works, though not strictly programmatic, as “musical evocations of external visual stimuli.”
- F minor: Seemingly a march, but peppered with metric irregularities, the opening étude-tableau harks back to Chopin’s A-minor Etude Op. 25 No. 4 in juxtaposing a staccato bass with a sustained soprano melody.
- C major: This étude-tableau features a soaring melody over a pulsating accompaniment in open harmonies (chords covering an octave or more). The beautiful coda closes with radiant trills.
- C minor: A richly textured elegy transitions to a weightless dreamscape in C major, its wide-open harmonies conjuring infinite calm.
- D minor: A fanfare on open fifths becomes the motivic germ.
- E-flat minor: This étude-tableau is sometimes nicknamed the “Snowstorm.” Its swirling triplets and pizzicato-like accents make it quite technically difficult.
- E-flat major: Like the D-minor étude-tableau, this piece begins with a fanfare, though the work’s mood is significantly brighter.
- The G minor is an elegiac nocturne whose placid surface is ruptured halfway through by a swirling cadenza.
- C-sharp minor: Like a prophet proclaiming the apocalypse, the final movement of the Op. 33 Études-Tableaux is declamatory and defiant.
