The Sonata in B minor, Op. 58, the second of Chopin's notable pianoforte sonatas (the third if we take into account the unpalatable Op. 4), made its appearance five years later, in June, 1845. Unity is as little discernible in this sonata as in its predecessor. The four movements of which the work consists are rather affiliated than cognate; nay, this may be said even of many parts of the movements. The first movement by far surpasses the other three in importance: indeed, the wealth of beautiful and interesting matter which is here heaped up—for it is rather an unsifted accumulation than an artistic presentation and evolution—would have sufficed many a composer for several movements. The ideas are very unequal and their course very jerky till we come to the second subject (D major), which swells out into a broad stream of impassioned melody. Farther on the matter becomes again jerky and mosaic-like. While the close of the first part is very fine, the beginning of the second is a comfortless waste. Things mend with the re-entrance of the subsidiary part of the second subject (now in D flat major), which, after being dwelt upon for some time and varied, disappears, and is followed by a repetition of portions of the first subject, the whole second subject (in B major), and the closing period, which is prolonged by a coda to make the close more emphatic and satisfying. A light and graceful quaver figure winds with now rippling, now waving motion through the first and third sections of the scherzo; in the contrasting second section, with the sustained accompaniment and the melody in one of the middle parts, the entrance of the bright A major, after the gloom of the preceding bars, is very effective. The third movement has the character of a nocturne, and as such cannot fail to be admired. In the visionary dreaming of the long middle section we imagine the composer with dilated eyes and rapture in his look—it is rather a reverie than a composition. The finale surrounds us with an emotional atmosphere somewhat akin to that of the first movement, but more agitated. After eight bold introductory bars with piercing dissonances begins the first subject, which, with its rhythmically differently-accompanied repetition, is the most important constituent of the movement. The rest, although finely polished, is somewhat insignificant. In short, this is the old story, plus de volonte que d'inspiration, that is to say, inspiration of the right sort. And also, plus de volonte que de savoir-faire.
There is one work of Chopin's to which Liszt's dictum, plus de volnte que d'inspiratio, applies in all, and even more than all its force. I allude to the Sonata (in G minor) for piano and violoncello, Op. 65 (published in September, 1847), in which hardly anything else but effort, painful effort, manifests itself. The first and last movements are immense wildernesses with only here and there a small flower. The middle movements, a Scherzo and an Andante, do not rise to the dignity of a sonata, and, moreover, lack distinction, especially the slow movement, a nocturne-like dialogue between the two instruments. As to the beauties—such as the first subject of the first movement (at the entrance of the violoncello), the opening bars of the Scherzo, part of the ANDANTE, &c.—they are merely beginnings, springs that lose themselves soon in a sandy waste. Hence I have not the heart to controvert Moscheles who, in his diary, says some cutting things about this work: "In composition Chopin proves that he has only isolated happy thoughts which he does not know how to work up into a rounded whole. In the just published sonata with violoncello I find often passages which sound as if someone were preluding on the piano and knocked at all the keys to learn whether euphony was at home." [FOOTNOTE: Aus Moscheles' Leben; Vol. II., p. 171.] An entry of the year 1850 runs as follows: "But a trial of patience of another kind is imposed on me by Chopin's Violoncello Sonata, which I am arranging for four hands. To me it is a tangled forest, through which now and then penetrates a gleam of the sun." [FOOTNOTE: Ibid., Vol. II., p. 216.] To take up after the last-discussed work a composition like the Grand Duo Concertant for piano and violoncello, on themes from "Robert le Diable," by Chopin and A. Franchomme, is quite a relief, although it is really of no artistic importance. Schumann is right when he says of this DUO, which saw the light of publicity (without OPUS number) in 1833:14 [FOOTNOTE: The first performance of Meyerbeer's "Robert le Diable" took place at the Paris Opera on November 21, 1831.] "A piece for a SALON where behind the shoulders of counts and countesses now and then rises the head of a celebrated artist." And he may also be right when he says:—
It seems to me that Chopin sketched the whole of it, and that Franchomme said "yes" to everything; for what Chopin touches takes his form and spirit, and in this minor salon-style he expresses himself with grace and distinction, compared with which all the gentility of other brilliant composers together with all their elegance vanish into thin air.
The mention of the DUO is somewhat out of place here, but the Sonata, Op. 65, in which the violoncello is employed, naturally suggested it.
We have only one more work to consider before we come to the groups of masterpieces in the smaller forms above enumerated. But this last work is one of Chopin's best compositions, and in its way no less a masterpiece than these. Unfettered by the scheme of a definite form such as the sonata or concerto, the composer develops in the Fantaisie, Op. 49 (published in November, 1841), his thought with masterly freedom. There is an enthralling weirdness about this work, a weirdness made up of force of passion and an indescribable fantastic waywardness. Nothing more common than the name of Fantasia, here we have the thing! The music falls on our ears like the insuppressible outpouring of a being stirred to its heart's core, and full of immeasurable love and longing. Who would suspect the composer's fragility and sickliness in this work? Does it not rather suggest a Titan in commotion? There was a time when I spoke of the Fantasia in a less complimentary tone, now I bow down my head regretfully and exclaim peccavi. The disposition of the composition may be thus briefly indicated. A tempo di marcia opens the Fantasia—it forms the porch of the edifice. The dreamy triplet passages of the poco a poco piu mosso are comparable to galleries that connect the various blocks of buildings. The principal subject, or accumulation of themes, recurs again and again in different keys, whilst other subjects appear only once or twice between the repetitions of the principal subject.
The mazurkas of Chopin are a literature in themselves, said Lenz, and there is some truth in his saying. They may, indeed, be called a literature in themselves for two reasons—first, because of their originality, which makes them things sui generis; and secondly, because of the poetical and musical wealth of their contents. Chopin, as I have already said, is most national in the mazurkas and polonaises, for the former of which he draws not only inspiration, but even rhythmic, melodic, and harmonic motives from his country's folk-music. Liszt told me, in a conversation I had with him, that he did not care much for Chopin's mazurkas. "One often meets in them with bars which might just as well be in another place." But he added, "And yet as Chopin puts them, perhaps nobody else could have put them." And mark, those are the words of one who also told me that when he sometimes played half-an-hour for his amusement, he liked to resort to Chopin. Moscheles, I suspect, had especially the mazurkas in his mind when, in 1833, [FOOTNOTE: At this time the published compositions of Chopin were, of course, not numerous, but they included the first two books of Mazurkas, Op. 6 and 7.] he said of the Polish master's compositions that he found "much charm in their originality and national colouring," and that "his thoughts and through them the fingers stumbled over certain hard, inartistic modulations." Startling progressions, unreconciled contrasts, and abrupt changes of mood are characteristic of Slavonic music and expressive of the Slavonic character. Whether they ought to be called inartistic or not, we will leave time to decide, if it has not done so already; the Russian and other Slavonic composers, who are now coming more and more to the front, seem to be little in doubt as to their legitimacy. I neither regard Chopin's mazurkas as his most artistic achievements nor recommend their capriciousness and fragmentariness for general imitation. But if we view them from the right stand-point, which is not that of classicism, we cannot help admiring them. The musical idiom which the composer uses in these, notwithstanding their capriciousness and fragmentariness, exquisitely-finished miniatures, has a truly delightful piquancy. Yet delightful as their language is, the mazurkas have a far higher claim to our admiration. They are poems—social poems, poems of private life, in distinction from the polonaises, which are political poems. Although Chopin's mazurkas and polonaises are no less individual than the other compositions of this most subjective of subjective poets, they incorporate, nevertheless, a good deal of the poetry of which the national dances of those names are the expression or vehicle. And let it be noted, in Poland so-called civilisation did not do its work so fast and effectually as in Western Europe; there dancing had not yet become in Chopin's days a merely formal and conventional affair, a matter of sinew and muscle.
It is, therefore, advisable that we should make ourselves acquainted with the principal Polish dances; such an acquaintance, moreover, will not only help us to interpret aright Chopin's mazurkas and polonaises, but also to gain a deeper insight into his ways of feeling and seeing generally. Now the reader will become aware that the long disquisitions on Poland and the Poles at the commencement of this biography were not superfluous accessories. For completeness' sake I shall preface the description of the mazurka by a short one of the krakowiak, the third of the triad of principal Polish dances. The informants on whom I shall chiefly rely when I am not guided by my own observations are the musician Sowinski and the poet Brodzinski, both Poles:
The krakowiak [says Albert Sowinski in chant polonais] bubbles over with esprit and gaiety; its name indicates its origin. It is the delight of the salons, and especially of the huts. The Cracovians dance it in a very agitated and expressive manner, singing at the same time words made for the occasion of which they multiply the stanzas and which they often improvise. These words are of an easy gaiety which remind one strangely of the rather loose [semi-grivoises] songs so popular in France; others again are connected with the glorious epochs of history, with the sweet or sad memories which it calls up, and are a faithful expression of the character and manners of the nation.
Casimir Brodzinski describes the dance as follows:—
The krakowiak resembles in its figures a simplified polonaise; it represents, compared with the latter, a less advanced social state. The boldest and strongest takes the position of leader and conducts the dance; he sings, the others join in chorus; he dances, they imitate him. Often also the krakowiak represents, in a kind of little ballet, the simple course of a love-affair: one sees a couple of young people place themselves before the orchestra; the young man looks proud, presumptuous, preoccupied with his costume and beauty. Before long he becomes meditative, and seeks inspiration to improvise verses which the cries of his companions ask for, and which the time beaten by them provoke, as well as the manoeuvre of the young girl, who is impatient to dance. Arriving before the orchestra after making a round, the dancer generally takes the liberty of singing a refrain which makes the young girl blush; she runs away, and it is in pursuing her that the young man displays all his agility. At the last round it is the young man who pretends to run away from his partner; she tries to seize his arm, after which they dance together until the ritornello puts an end to their pleasure.