Esquisses (Sketches), Op. 63 is a set of 49 short piano pieces by French composer Charles-Valentin Alkan and published in 1861. The pieces are divided into four books; the first pair of books and the last pair each comprise between them pieces in each of all the major and minor keys. Book 4 ends with an extra, unnumbered, piece, Laus Deo, in C major. Four pianists have recorded the set in its entirety: Laurent Martin, Osamu Nakamura (now Osamu Kanazawa), Steven Osborne, and Yui Morishita (twice).
Unlike many other of Alkan's pieces, such as the Op. 33 Grand Sonate and the Op. 39 set of etudes in all the minor keys, these 49 pieces do not focus mainly on virtuosity and transcendentalism and instead contain more of Alkan's sentimental and evocative writing. Alkan's innovation is also vividly present in the pieces. The 45th piece, Les Diablotins, features wrenched cluster chords and the 48th piece, En Songe, is a dreamy and quiet piece all except for the very final chord, which is a sudden F major chord with the dynamic ff. The 39th piece, Héraclite et Démocrite, features two sharply contrasting themes for the respective philosophers, and at some passages Alkan overlaps the themes to create a solemn and sad theme in the left hand and a bouncy and joyous theme in the right.
The Esquisses
Book 1
La Vision in C major
Le Staccatissimo in F minor
Le Legatissimo in D major
Les Cloches in G minor
Les Initiés in E major (features a quote from Aristophanes' The Frogs instead of a title in some editions)
Fuguette in A minor
Le Frisson in F♯ major
Pseudo-Naïveté in B minor
Confidence in A♭ major
Increpatio in C♯ minor
Les Soupirs in B♭ major
Barcarollette in E♭ minor
Book 2
Ressouvenir in C minor
Duettino in F major
Tutti de Concerto dans le genre ancien in D minor
Fantasie in G major
Petit prélude à trois in E minor
Liedchen in A major
Grâces in F♯ minor
Petit marche villageoise in B major
Morituri te salutant in G♯ minor
Innocenzia in D♭ major
L'homme aux sabots in B♭ minor
Contredanse in E♭ major
Book 3
La poursuite in C major
Petit air, Genre ancien in G minor
Rigaudon in D major
Inflexibilité (also known as Rigidité) in A minor
Délire in E major
Petit air dolent in B minor
Début de quatuor in F♯ major
Minuetto in C♯ minor
"Fais dodo" in A♭ major
Odi profanum vulgus et arceo, Favete linguis in E♭ minor
Musique militaire in B♭ major
Toccatina in F minor
Book 4
Scherzettino in C minor
"Le ciel vous soit toujours prospére" (also known as Les bons souhaits) in G major
A prelude is a short piece of music, the form of which may vary from piece to piece. While, during the Baroque era, for example, it may have served as an introduction to succeeding movements of a work that were usually longer and more complex, it may also have been a stand-alone piece of work during the Romantic era. It generally features a small number of rhythmic and melodic motifs that recur through the piece. Stylistically, the prelude is improvisatory in nature. The term may also refer to an overture, particularly to those seen in an opera or an oratorio.
Charles-Valentin Alkan was a French Jewish composer and virtuoso pianist. At the height of his fame in the 1830s and 1840s he was, alongside his friends and colleagues Frédéric Chopin and Franz Liszt, among the leading pianists in Paris, a city in which he spent virtually his entire life.
Franz Schubert's Impromptus are a series of eight pieces for solo piano composed in 1827. They were published in two sets of four impromptus each: the first two pieces in the first set were published in the composer's lifetime as Op. 90; the second set was published posthumously as Op. 142 in 1839. The third and fourth pieces in the first set were published in 1857. The two sets are now catalogued as D. 899 and D. 935 respectively. They are considered to be among the most important examples of this popular early 19th-century genre.
F major is a major scale based on F, with the pitches F, G, A, B♭, C, D, and E. Its key signature has one flat. Its relative minor is D minor and its parallel minor is F minor.
G minor is a minor scale based on G, consisting of the pitches G, A, B♭, C, D, E♭, and F. Its key signature has two flats. Its relative major is B-flat major and its parallel major is G major.
Grande sonate: Les quatre âges is a four movement sonata for piano by Charles-Valentin Alkan. The sonata's title refers to the subtitles given to each movement, portraying a man at the ages of 20, 30, 40, and 50. The work was published in 1847, dedicated to the composer's father, Alkan Morhange.
Trois morceaux dans le genre pathétique Op. 15 is a three-movement suite for piano composed by the French composer, Charles-Valentin Alkan, published in 1837. The suite also bears the title Souvenirs (Memories). The 3 movements are Aime-moi, Le vent, and Morte.
Concerto for Solo Piano is a 3-movement solo piano piece written by Charles-Valentin Alkan. The pieces are part of a 12 piece cycle entitled Douze études dans tous les tons mineurs, published in 1857. With sections marked "Tutti", "Solo" and "Piano", the piece requires the soloist to present the voices of both the orchestra and the soloist. The pianist Jack Gibbons comments: "The style and form of the music take on a monumental quality—rich, thickly set textures and harmonies ... conjure up the sound world of a whole orchestra and tax the performer, both physically and mentally, to the limit."
Le festin d'Ésope, Op. 39 No. 12, is a piano étude by Charles-Valentin Alkan. It is the final étude in the set Douze études dans tous les tons mineurs, Op. 39, published in 1857. It is a work of twenty-five variations based on an original theme and is in E minor. The technical skills required in the variations are a summation of the preceding études.
The Klavierübung, by the Italian pianist-composer Ferruccio Busoni, is a compilation of piano exercises and practice pieces, comprising transcriptions of works by other composers and original compositions of his own.
Sergei Prokofiev's Piano Sonata No. 3 in A minor, Op. 28 (1917) is a sonata composed for solo piano, using sketches dating from 1907. Prokofiev gave the première of this in St. Petersburg on April 15, 1918, during a week-long festival of his music sponsored by the Conservatory.
There is a long tradition in classical music of writing music in sets of pieces that cover all the major and minor keys of the chromatic scale. These sets typically consist of 24 pieces, one for each of the major and minor keys.
Charles-Valentin Alkan wrote 25 preludes for solo piano or organ in 1844; they were published as his Op. 31 in 1847. These preludes span all 24 major and minor keys, plus an additional 25th prelude in C major.
Grande Pièce Symphonique, Op.17, FWV 29, is an organ work by French composer César Franck. Written in 1860–62, it is the second and, at an average duration of 25 minutes, the largest piece from Six Pièces pour Grand Orgue. It is dedicated to the composer Charles-Valentin Alkan.
The Symphony for Solo Piano is a large-scale romantic work for piano composed by Charles-Valentin Alkan and published in 1857.
Evelyne Crochet is a Franco-American classical pianist.
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