Chopin’s Prelude in C Major Revisited: Integrating Sound and Symbol

Volume 13, Number 1, March 2007[1.1] In this study, I explore the relationship between recorded performances and written analyses as a resource for analysis. The comparison of recordings is a tool that can influence how we approach analysis and teach our courses, a tool no less significant than those involving theoretical methodologies of form, harmony, and rhythm.(1) As the prominent theorist Joel Lester (1995) states:Just as analysts use scores as avenues to the pieces they analyze, refer to other analyses with approbation or disapproval, they can-and should, I would argue- refer to performances in order to get at the essence of the pieces they analyze. ... The vast repertoire of recordings remains a resource barely noticed by theoretical discourse.(2)[1.2] A close reading of the historical record supports the notion that we realize music through both sound and symbol. Perhaps, therefore, we need to reconsider our ideas about analysis and how we teach it to our students. As musicologist Nicholas Cook (2001) recently notes:[The] most obvious way of studying music as performance is, quite simply, to study those traces or representations of past performances that make up the recorded heritage, thereby unlocking an archive of acoustical texts comparable in extent and significance to the notated texts ... (3)[1.3] Toward this end, I use several recordings and written analyses of Chopin's Prelude in C Major, Op. 28, No. 1.(4) My intent is not to suggest that analysis "corrects" performance (or vice versa); instead, I explore the intersections and digressions between performances and analyses, an approach that provides greater insights than traditional analysis. An intersection occurs when a performance in some demonstrable way projects (or "supports") an aspect of the music revealed in an analysis. A digression, on the other hand, occurs when performances and analyses have nothing in common, or even contradict one another.(5) My discussion about the integration of sound and symbol focuses initially on local levels and is followed by an examination of large-scale events. It will be helpful to follow the score as you listen to the recorded excerpts and examine the analyses (see attached score: [DjVu] [GIF]).Part I: The Opening Four MeasuresNeighbors, Passing Tones, or Something Else[2.1] We begin by comparing two different recordings of bars 1-4 of Chopin's Prelude. The first recording is by Grigory Sokolov(6) and the second by Alicia DeLarrocha.(7) As you listen, focus on the opening G-A gestures in the upper line. Play the opening 12 measures of Sokolov (Clip #1) followed by DeLarrocha (Clip #2).[2.2] The performances differ in their interpretations of the upper line. Sokolov projects a legato, almost seamless connection between the G-A figures, whereas DeLarrocha articulates a break after each A, creating a disjointed motion. Now consider how these performances intersect with published analyses. Examples 1a and 1b show analyses by Roger Graybill.(8) Both illustrate a motion through a fourth, from G to C (bars 1-4). In Example 1a, the first tone of the linear progression, G, is twice decorated by an upper-neighbor A before the line moves through the passing tones A and B to the goal C.Example 1a. Neighbor-note motion, bars 1-2 (1994, p. 218)Example 1b. Interrupted passing motion, bars 1-2 (1994, p. 218)In Example 1b, I use the symbol // to illustrate what Graybill writes:I hear the upper line not as two G-A-G neighbor motions followed by a G-to-C passing motion, but rather as two ascending G-A motions i?½interrupted" in their upward striving to reach C, followed by a successful G-A-B-C ascent (emphasis mine).(9)This interpretation takes into account the break between the As and following Gs, a grouping particularly well-defined because the final As are only a triplet sixteenth in duration (followed by a rest). …