106 (the already discussed superelision); because toward the end (from m. 118 on) the new phrase initiates a move back to Eb and ends with a half cadence in that key (or rathe[r]
Trang 1The Form of Chopin's "Ballade," Op 23
Author(s): Karol Berger
Source: 19th-Century Music, Vol 20, No 1 (Summer, 1996), pp 46-71
Published by: University of California Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/746667
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19th-http://www.jstor.org
Trang 2The Form of Chopin's Ballade, Op 23
KAROL BERGER
The main challenge facing a composer of a
relatively long and complex work is that of
continuity A short piece may be built from a
single phrase, or a few phrases arranged in a
simple pattern (such as Chopin's favorite, and
infinitely varied, ABA) In a longer work, how-
ever, the question arises: When the end of a
phrase has been reached, what comes next?
Change by itself is easy to achieve: it is enough
to string one phrase after another The difficul-
ties begin when one wants not just one-phrase-
after-another but a continuous discourse, a
"configuration" (to use Paul Ricoeur's term) in
which "one-after-the-other" becomes "one
because-of-the-other," a whole rather than a
heap-that is, when the form of the work is
"narrative" as opposed to "lyric."
In a separate essay, I have explained why one
19th-Century Music XX/1 (Summer 1996) ? by The Re-
gents of the University of California
might want to understand narrative and lyric
as the two most fundamental forms of compo- sition.' In a narrative (or temporal) form, parts succeed one another in a determined order, and their succession is governed by the relation- ships of causing and resulting by necessity or probability On the other hand, in a lyrical (atemporal) form, the parts, whether existing simultaneously or succeeding one another, are governed by the relationship of the necessary
or probable mutual implication Thus, in creat- ing a narrative work, one must not only give each phrase a function within the whole, but also establish, for instance, that the later phrases are in some way caused or prepared by some- thing that happened earlier (although not nec-
'See my "Narrative and Lyric: Fundamental Poetic Forms
of Composition," in Musical Humanism and Its Legacy: Essays in Honor of Claude V Palisca, ed N K Baker and
B R Hanning (Stuyvesant, N.Y., 1992), pp 451-70
46
Trang 3essarily in the immediately preceding phrase)
The relationships of causing and resulting are
the main means of achieving narrative conti-
nuity
In identifying the main problem of any large,
complex, narrative form with continuity and
its solution with probabilistic causality, one
need not see either issue as being faced only by
the composer The listener and the performer
face the same problem and have the same means
of solving it at their disposal Once they as-
sume that they are dealing with a single work,
performers and listeners must attempt to de-
termine (by continuously proposing, trying out,
and revising hypotheses, in the process of play-
ing or listening) how the whole is divided into
parts and what function each part has in mak-
ing up the whole.2 And once they assume that
the work is narrative, they must then look for
the relationships of causing and resulting among
the parts
Both the problem and its solution pertain to
the structure of the work itself, as I shall dem-
onstrate Neither the composer's nor the
performer's and the listener's thought processes
will matter here; rather what matter primarily
are the constitution and significance of the
world that the composer's work presents as an
occasion for the performer's and listener's in-
terpretations-the world that, after all, is al-
ways someone's interpretation (in this case,
my own) But it would not be surprising if the
young Chopin consciously shared the classicist
ambition to create wholes rather than heaps,
since this was clearly the tenor of the music
education that he received in Warsaw Indeed,
at the beginning of his stay in Paris, he received
a letter from his composition teacher, J6zef
Elsner, writing from Warsaw on 27 November
1831, advising him that "the concept of the
whole in the work is the mark of a true artist; a
21 have argued that the unity of the work is the reader's
necessary, not optional, assumption in "Diegesis and Mi-
mesis: The Poetic Modes and the Matter of Artistic Pre-
sentation," Journal of Musicology 12 (1994), 407-33; and I
have discussed the temporal nature of the process of musi-
cal interpretation in "Toward a History of Hearing: The
Classic Concerto, A Sample Case," in Convention in Eigh-
teenth- and Nineteenth-Century Music: Essays in Honor
of Leonard G Ratner, ed W J Allanbrook, J M Levy, and
W P Mahrt (Stuyvesant, N.Y., 1992), pp 405-29
craftsman puts one stone on another, places one beam on another."3
What follows, then, is an exercise in formal- ist close reading of, in this case, Chopin's First Ballade in G Minor, op 23 (published in 1836)
This is a silent imaginary performance, a read- ing that would be followed most profitably with the score in hand Elsewhere, in a companion essay, I have attempted to show how one might subject the results of such a reading to a further interpretation and might move beyond formal- ism, without sacrificing its insights and with- out falling into the familiar trap at the bottom
of which waits, grinning, Hermann Kretz- schmar.4
I
I consider first the "punctuation form," the way the work is articulated into a hierarchy of parts by means of stronger and weaker ca- dences.5 Form, after all, involves a relationship between the parts and the whole, and if the form is temporal, the parts succeed one an- other In the last two centuries, musical form has been commonly thought of as produced by the manipulation of two factors, key and theme
The musical form, on this view, results from
an interaction of a tonal plan consisting of a succession of stable and unstable tonal areas and a thematic plan consisting of an exposi- tion, development, and recapitulation of themes This view suppresses a much older,
"rhetorical" conception (Dahlhaus's term),6 still well remembered by theorists in the late eigh- teenth century, whereby a form results in the
3"Pojecie caXosci w dziele znamieniem jest prawdziwego artysty; rzemieslnik stawia kamief na kamief, belke na belke kladzie" (Fryderyk Chopin, Korespondencja, ed
BronisXaw Edward Sydow, vol I [Warsaw, 1955], p 198)
(All translations in this article are mine unless otherwise indicated.)
4See my "Chopin's Ballade Op 23 and the Revolution of the Intellectuals," in Chopin Studies 2, ed John Rink and Jim Samson (Cambridge, 1994), pp 72-83
5For an introduction to the concept of "punctuation form"
and for an explanation of the punctuation terminology used here, see my "The First-Movement Punctuation Form
in Mozart's Piano Concertos," in Mozart's Piano Concer- tos: Text, Context, Interpretation, ed N Zaslaw (Ann Ar- bor, 1996), pp 239-59
6Carl Dahlhaus, "Das rhetorische Formbegriff H Chr
Kochs und die Theorie der Sonatenform," Archiv fiir Musikwissenschaft 35 (1978), 155-77
KAROL BERGER Chopin's Ballade,
op 23
Trang 419TH first place from "punctuation" (to speak with
CENTURY Koch),7 an articulation of the musical discourse MUSIC
by means of cadences of varying strength The
cadential punctuation articulates the whole into
successive parts and provides the framework
within which the respective roles of other for-
mal factors, of keys and themes, can be under-
stood By the 1830s, theorists lost much of the
interest in cadences and punctuation that ani-
mated their predecessors from the sixteenth
through the eighteenth centuries Cadence was
too conventional an object to attract much at-
tention in an age that appreciated originality
above all else and found it in the uniqueness of
the thematic and harmonic invention and ma-
nipulation But this lack of theoretical interest
should not blind one to the continued impor-
tance of punctuation in the practice of a com-
poser for whom the music of Bach and Mozart
continued to be a living presence
The main musical discourse of the G-Minor Ballade, the Moderato (in 6; mm 9-208),8 is
framed on both sides, by the Largo9 introduc-
7Heinrich Christoph Koch, Versuch einer Anleitung zur
Composition, 3 vols (Leipzig, 1782-93)
8Throughout this article, I measure a section from its first
melodic downbeat, no matter how long the preceding up-
beat, to its last melodic downbeat, even when the first
melodic downbeat of the next section is simultaneous with
this last downbeat (i.e., even when the two phrases are
"elided"), or when the upbeat of the next section follows
immediately in the same measure (and the two phrases
are "linked")
9Largo is the indication in Chopin's autograph (formerly
in the collection of Gregor Piatigorski, Los Angeles) and in
the French first edition (Paris, 1836), which was certainly
prepared on the basis of this autograph and probably proof-
read by the composer In the German first edition (Leipzig,
1836), the indication is Lento Of the two principal mod-
ern editors of the Ballade, Ewald Zimmermann chooses
the autograph and the Schlesinger edition as the basis of
his text, implicitly rejecting the readings of the Breitkopf
and Hartel edition as inauthentic (see the "Kritischer
Bericht" accompanying Frederic Chopin, Balladen, ed
Ewald Zimmermann [Munich, 1976], p 3), whereas Jan
Ekier argues for the authenticity of the German first edi-
tion, claiming that it was "based on corrected proofs of F
[the French first edition] on which Chopin made a number
of additional changes" ("Critical Notes" to Frederic Chopin,
Balladen, ed Jan Ekier [Vienna, 1986], p xxi; for detailed
arguments on which this conclusion is based, see the
Komentarze ir6dXowe published with Fryderyk Chopin,
Ballady, Wydanie Narodowe A.1, ed Jan Ekier [Cracow,
1970]) Ekier's claims for the authenticity of the German
first edition do not convince (Compare also Zofia
Chechlifiska, "The National Edition of Chopin's Works,"
Chopin Studies 2 [1987], 7-19.) He asserts, for instance,
that a change of tempo indication was too major a revision
tion (in C; mm 1-8) and the Presto con fuoco coda (in ?; mm 209-64) The two parts of the frame could not be less balanced: at the begin- ning, a mere eight measures, without so much
as a hint of cadence either internally or at the end, articulated only by brief rests, as if the speaker were short of breath or, better, still turning in his mind the subject of the about-to- be-opened story; at the end, fifty-six measures
to have been introduced by anyone other than the com- poser, but he himself refers to a number of Chopin's works where tempo indications differ between the French and German first editions, without being able to show that these differences can be attributed to Chopin Similarly,
he claims that the celebrated Breitkopf and Hartel reading
of the left hand in m 7, with dl instead of e6l, represents too important a revision to have been introduced without the composer's authorization, but since-as Ekier himself notes-the revision corrects the parallel fifths between the right and left hands (mm 6-7), it might well have been introduced by a pedantic house editor in Leipzig By claim- ing that Breitkopf and Hartel based their text on corrected proofs of the Schlesinger edition, Ekier ignores the fact that a manuscript of the Ballade, whether the composer's autograph or a copy, was still in the possession of the Leipzig publishers in 1878 (see their letter to Chopin's sister, Izabela Barcifiska, dated Leipzig, 1 February 1878, quoted and discussed in Krystyna Kobylafiska, Rekopisy Utwor6w Chopina: Katalog, vol I [Cracow, 1977], p 126; see also Kobylafiska, Frederic Chopin: Thematisch- bibliographisches Werkverzeichnis, ed Ernst Herttrich, trans Helmut Stolze [Munich, 1979], p 46) Most likely, the German first edition was based on this manuscript and never proofread by the composer (See, however, n 19 below.) This would be fully consistent with Chopin's nor- mal publishing practices, as described by Jeffrey Kallberg ("Chopin in the Marketplace: Aspects of the International Music Publishing Industry in the First Half of the Nine- teenth Century," Notes 39 [1982-83], 535-69, 795-824):
"Throughout his career, he would ordinarily give an auto- graph manuscript to the French publisher for use in en- graving the edition In his middle years (roughly 1835- 41), copyists were allowed to read over proofs, and at least some of the time, Chopin would check over these copyist- corrected proofs before submitting them to the publisher But during these years, Chopin did not entirely relinquish proof-reading [p 551] Until mid-1835, Chopin's Ger- man editions were engraved from printed proofs originat- ing in France From late 1835 through the remainder of his career, manuscripts were as a rule sent eastward As in France, the years 1835 to 1841 saw copyists' manuscripts employed along with autographs Most of the manu- scripts were reviewed by Chopin prior to being forwarded
to Leipzig [pp 808-09] While the composer in his
early years and once or twice later sent proofs of his music
to Germany to serve as engraver's copy, no case is known where he corrected proof sheets engraved by one of his German publishers Once his music in whatever form left his hands for Leipzig, Vienna, or another German pub- lishing center, Chopin's ability to oversee the musical text ceased" (pp 815-16)
An important additional consideration should be men-
Trang 5of emphatic peroration, ending (in m 250) with
a cadence whose powers of closure are enhanced
as much by the length of the dominant preced-
ing the final tonic (mm 246-49) as by the dura-
tion of the appendix prolonging the tonic (mm
250-64), and articulated internally by three
weaker cadences (mm 212, 216, 224) In spite
of (or rather because of) the introduction's hesi-
tant and open character at the beginning, the
design is insistently goal-oriented and closed at
the end This is a discourse in search of an aim
Once the aim is reached, it is repeatedly
stressed One could imagine a number of ways
in which the "speaker" might have eased his
way into the Moderato, but after the Presto
absolutely nothing remains to be said
The Moderato itself preserves unmistakable
traces of the sonata-allegro tradition The regu-
lar first period (mm 9-90), to speak in punctua-
tion terms (or, in thematic terms, the exposi-
tion), consists of two balanced (antecedent-con-
sequent) phrases (mm 9-36 = 8 mm + 20 mm.;
and mm 68-82 = 8 mm + 7 mm.), the first
followed by three appendixes prolonging the
tioned here As far as I know, none of the student exemplars
of the Ballade that survive with the composer's autograph
annotations corrects the introductory tempo indication or
the left-hand chord in m 7 to conform with the Breitkopf and
Hartel readings (See Kobylafska, Rekopisy, I, 127; idem,
Werkverzeichnis, p 46; Fr6deric Chopin, (Euvres pour pi-
ano: facsimile de 1'exemplaire de Jane W Stirling, ed Jean-
Jacques Eigeldinger and Jean-Michel Nectoux [Paris, 1982])
Thus, in the unlikely case that these readings stem from the
composer himself, they would represent an ultimately re-
jected momentary hesitation on his part Finally, an early
autograph of the first fifteen or sixteen measures of the
Ballade, known to exist in a private collection, is also
marked Largo (Kobylafiska, Werkverzeichnis, "Erganzungen:
Berichtigungen," Musikantiquariat Hans Schneider,
Bedeutende Musikerautographen, Catalog No 241 [Tutzing,
1980], p 16) In sum, while complete certainty in this matter
is unlikely (unless the manuscript mentioned in Breitkopf
and Hartel's letter to Barcifiska comes to light), it seems
most plausible to conclude that the readings transmitted in
the German first edition are not authentic and that the
authorized text is best represented by the French first edition
read in conjunction with the autograph and whatever can be
learned from the annotations in the exemplars that belonged
to the composer or his students Needless to say, this
conclusion in no way detracts from the interest that the
Breitkopf and Hartel readings may hold for the student of the
performance and reception history of the work outside
France and England Heinrich Schenker's argument in favor
of the German reading of m 7 is as telling as it is unconvinc-
ing See Schenker, Der freie Satz (2nd edn Vienna, 1956), p
110 and fig 64, ex 2
final cadential tonic of the phrase (mm 36-44, 45-48, and 49-56) and the second by one such appendix (mm 83-90) The two phrases are connected by a twelve-measure unpunctuated and uncadenced transition (mm 56-67) As is the norm in Chopin's sonata practice, the ab- breviated last period (the recapitulation) restates only the second half of the "expositional" first period, that is, only the second balanced phrase and its appendix (mm 166-88 corresponding to
mm 68-90) But what happens in between these two broad periods (mm 91-166) and after them (mm 189-208) defies any explanation in terms
of the sonata-allegro tradition For want of bet- ter terms, one might speak in a preliminary fashion of a complex two-part transition (mm
91-137) preparing the central episode (mm 138- 66) and another, simpler one-part transition (mm 189-208) preparing the coda Now it is immediately apparent that the latter transition (mm 189-208) corresponds to (or recapitulates) the first part of the former transition (mm 91- 106) in its punctuation form as well as its har- monic and thematic content: the four mea- sures of modulation ending with a hint of a half cadence (mm 91-94) are recapitulated in six measures (mm 189-94), and the twelve-mea- sure appendix prolonging the cadential domi- nant (mm 95-106) is recapitulated in twelve measures (mm 195-206) and followed by a two- measure appendix that resolves the dominant
to the tonic (mm 207-08).10 Moreover, the cen- tral episode (mm 138-66) resembles in its rela- tive harmonic stability and especially in its
'?Given the very close correspondence of mm 189-208 and 91-106, no analyst that I am aware of considers the latter section to be a part of the exposition, and Chopin's well-known practice of recapitulating normally only the second half of the exposition, it is puzzling that so many analysts of op 23, including most recently even the usu- ally admirably perceptive Jim Samson, identify a mirror or symmetrical recapitulation (with the first theme recapitu- lated after the second one) in the work Compare Jim Samson, Chopin: The Four Ballades (Cambridge, 1992),
pp 45-50 The most noteworthy analyses of the Ballade
to appear after Samson's book are John Daverio, Nine- teenth-Century Music and the German Romantic Ideol- ogy (New York, 1993), pp 39-41, and Charles Rosen, The Romantic Generation (Cambridge, Mass., 1995), pp 323-
28 Daverio talks of "an overriding palindromic form" (p
40) Rosen, on the other hand, considers both returns of theme A as "a ritornello" or "a refrain" (p 327) and avoids any suggestion of a recapitulation
KAROL BERGER Chopin's Ballade,
op 23
Trang 6punctuation form, although not in its thematic
content, the coda (mm 209-64): both consist of
three short incises followed by a very large one
(in the episode, three four-measure incises are
followed by a seventeen-measure one; in the
coda, two incises of four measures each are
elided with one of nine measures, which is
elided in turn with a twenty-seven-measure
one, followed by a fifteen-measure appendix) (I
shall show that the correspondences between
the episode and the coda go further than that.)
Thus only the second part of the first transition
(mm 106-37) seems to be left without a direct
recapitulation or at least a corresponding sec-
tion in the last third of the piece Since this is,
however, a developed restatement of the sec-
ond balanced phrase of the main period (mm
106-26 = 8 mm + 13 mm., corresponding to
mm 68-82 = 8 mm + 7 mm.), this time ending
with a half rather than full cadence (m 126),
with the final cadential dominant prolonged by
the following appendix (mm 126-37), even this
music finds its corresponding counterpart, if
not an exact restatement, at the beginning of
the recapitulation (mm 166-88)
Figure 1 summarizes the punctuation form
of the Ballade (The recapitulating sections are
linked with the sections they recapitulate by
continuous vertical lines; sections correspond-
ing in some other, weaker way are linked by
interrupted lines; I and V mark sections ending
with a full or half cadence, respectively; +1 and
+V in parentheses mark appendixes prolonging
the final tonic or dominant of the preceding
cadence, respectively; 1 indicates that the sec-
tion is linked with the following one, e-that it
is elided with the following one; Arabic numer-
als count measures within a section.) Several
points clearly emerge First, the norm underly-
ing Chopin's balanced phrases (that is, the an-
tecedent-consequent phrases that present the
two main themes) seems to be two eight-mea-
sure incises, but the norm is obeyed (estab-
lished) in the first incise only to be departed
from in the second In the first (unrecapitulated)
phrase (mm 9-36), the generous expansion of
the second incise to twenty measures may per-
haps adumbrate the overall end-oriented shape
of the work Even if all parenthetical repetition
(mm 24-25 repeat mm 22-23) as well as the
parenthetical expansion of the penultimate
cadential dominant (mm 32-35-the only mea- sures that could be removed from the incise without a loss of motivic substance or gram- matical integrity) were removed from the sec- ond incise, a sizable consequent of fourteen measures would still remain On the other hand, the behavior of the second (recapitulated) phrase (mm 68-82 and 166-80) is quite different Here the slightly shorter consequent weakens the sense of closure and necessitates a continua- tion (When the phrase is recapitulated/devel- oped in mm 106-26, the consequent is made longer to make room for a modulation.) Whereas the balanced phrases are conceived in terms of the eight-plus-eight norm, the episode and the coda suggest another underlying norm, an addi- tive construction of four four-measure incises (I shall offer arguments for this reading later), with the norm observed only in the first two or three incises, and with an enormous expansion
of the last incise (Together with the conse- quent of the first phrase, these are by far the largest incises of the entire work.) Once again, the end-oriented shape of the whole is reflected
in the structure of these two sections This contributes to the sense of a discourse that constantly yearns for (and finally attains) an emphatic conclusion
Second, the handling of the cadences shows
an abiding concern for continuity To be sure, the discourse is marked by a number of ca- dence articulations, and all are additionally strengthened by one or more appendixes pro- longing their final chords Nevertheless, these cadences and appendixes (save, of course, the last one) are either linked or elided with the following music This ensures that the sense of articulation is never very strong-never as em- phatic, for instance, as the one commonly en- countered at the end of the first period (exposi- tion) of the Classical sonata-allegro
In addition to such obvious devices as the link and the elision, Chopin also uses subtler ways of smoothing over the joints between suc- cessive sections The introduction, for example,
is left without a cadence The cadence that should have closed it comes at the first down- beat of the following phrase (m 9), but because this downbeat is preceded by an upbeat, this is not a normal case of elision (in which the last melodic downbeat of a preceding section and
19TH
CENTURY
MUSIC
Trang 7Measure: 1 9 36
81 81 + 20e (5e + 51) Punctuation: le (+ Il)
Section: Intro First period:
phrase 1
(21 [21]) (8e) 121 81 + 71 (+11) (+ Ie) Il
91
41
vi
95 (1 2e) (+Ve)
106 126
81 +13e (121)
Ve (+Vl) Transition:
16 181 189 19 20
81 + 71 (41 [41]) 61 (121) (21)
Il (+11) VI (+V1) (+II) Last period:
part 1
Figure 1: The Punctuation form of Chopin's Ballade, op 23
Un
Trang 8the first of the following one coincide) Instead,
the melody of the introduction is interrupted
in midstream rather than concluded, and it is
only covertly continued through the upbeat and
first downbeat of the following phrase One
might call this a superelision.11 Similar cases of
superelision occur at the ends of the only other
two sections that lack cadences, the transition
between the first and second phrase of the first
period (mm 56-67) and the episode (mm 138-
66), parallel spots to the extent that both pre-
cede the same material, the second phrase of
the period In the former case, the cadence oc-
curs in m 69, that is, one measure after the
new phrase had begun (on the last quarter of m
67) Like the introduction, the transition is in-
terrupted in midstream and only covertly con-
tinued as the new phrase begins with the same
dyad the transition died out on And similarly,
the cadence that should have ended the episode
is delayed until m 167, that is, one measure
after the beginning of the next phrase The
melodic link (the dyad) between the episode
and the following phrase is lacking this time,
but the harmonic bond between them is much
stronger, since the cadence begins within the
episode and is completed within the phrase:
the cadential dominant is reached in m 158 in
the form of the six-four (Eb) chord, which is
prolonged through the downbeat of m 162 and
resolved by way of the chromatic passing chords
in mm 162-65 to the V (Bb) chord at the begin-
ning of the new phrase in m 166
Here, as throughout the Ballade, Chopin's evident goal is to punctuate without stopping,
to suggest points of articulation without im-
peding the drive toward the final destination
The composer's concern with such issues may
be graphically illustrated by his subtle revision
of the phrasing in mm 54-57 In the autograph,
mm 54-55 (i.e., the last two measures of the
final appendix to the first phrase) are placed
under one slur, and mm 56-57, the first two
measures of the following transition, are placed
"The articulation between the introduction and the first
period is further weakened by a subtle textural transition,
as the monophony of the parallel octaves in mm 1-5 gives
way to the first hint of the homophonic, melody-with-
accompaniment, texture in mm 6-7, thus preparing the
homophonic texture of the first period
under another In this way, Chopin originally marked a point of articulation between the ap- pendix and the transition very clearly In the French first edition, however, he decided to cover all four measures with a single slur, thus increasing the sense of continuity between the two sections
Third, full cadences are used to close the relatively stable sections that state or restate their material (the two balanced phrases of both periods and the coda), and half cadences close the relatively unstable sections, with the func- tion of preparing the appearance of the follow- ing, more stable sections (the two phrases of transition) Here Chopin strictly observes the Classical usage The central episode, however,
is anomalous, since-as observed earlier-it promises to close with a full cadence but post- pones its completion until after the beginning
of the next phrase and ends on the V3 chord This imaginative ending makes it at once a section of relative stability and transition Fourth, the relative strength of a cadence depends primarily on the length of its domi- nant; observe where the strongest cadences oc- cur and how they are handled The dominants
of longest duration are placed as follows: mm 94-106 (thirteen measures), the appendix of the first part of the transition between the first period and the central episode through the first measure of the following phrase (another case
of the superelision that always precedes the appearance of this material); mm 126-37 (twelve measures), the appendix of the second part of the first transition; mm 158-66 (nine measures), the already discussed cadence supereliding the episode with the last period;
mm 194-207 (fourteen measures), the two ap- pendixes of the second transition; and mm 238-49 (twelve measures), the final cadence of the work It is clear that once the main the- matic material has been presented, that is, im- mediately after the first period (exposition), the discourse consists essentially of one strong cadential statement after another Although there are no seriously prolonged dominants through the end of the first period (the only dominant-prolongation, lasting four-and-a-half measures, occurs at the cadence of the first phrase, mm 312-35), every phrase after the first period, with the sole exception of the
19TH
CENTURY
MUSIC
Trang 9Ie (+I11 (+I1) (+Ie
Intro First period:
Figure 2: The Harmonic and thematic plans of Chopin's Ballade, op 23
recapitulatory phrase of the last period, ends
with a seriously prolonged dominant But it is
noteworthy that only one, the final, of these
strong cadences is suited to conclude the dis-
course, since only it is simultaneously a full
cadence and has a final tonic prolonged by an
appendix The impression, again, is of a dis-
course in search of a suitably strong conclu-
sion, reached only after a number of less suc-
cessful rehearsals
II
In music analysis the "what" questions, al-
though indispensable, are generally less inter-
esting than the "why" questions It is clear at
this point what the punctuation form of the
Ballade is, but not why the work has this form
rather than another To make the first step in
this direction, I shall turn to the harmonic and
melodic matter of the musical discourse Fig-
ure 2 summarizes the harmonic and thematic
plans of the work, mapping them against the
already identified formal units Upper-and
lowercase Roman numerals stand for major and
minor keys respectively; an arrow marks a
modulation; V in parentheses signifies the domi-
nant preparation of the following key; quota-
tion marks around a Roman numeral indicate
that the key in question has not been adequately
prepared, that we are "on," but not "in" it, as
Tovey would say; a key is crossed-out when it
is prepared but withheld Capital letters iden-
tify major thematic ideas, lowercase letters, with or without Arabic numerals, identify mi- nor motivic ideas that serve to individualize less important formal units, such as appen- dixes; quotation marks around a letter indicate that the theme in question is being developed, rather than stated
Through the end of the first period, the har- monic plan of the Ballade more or less meets sonata-allegro expectations, at least to the ex- tent that it establishes the main key, modu- lates, and establishes the second key After- ward, it goes its own way To be sure, the further modulation one might expect does oc- cur, but, instead of leading toward new har- monic regions, it circles back to the second key; and the retransition and reestablishing of the main key occur much later than they would
in a sonata-allegro Thus, the basic plan con- sists of two tonic areas of roughly similar di- mensions at the beginning and end framing a much longer (more than twice as long as either
of the two tonic regions) central submediant area, the latter in three parts: a tonally stable one corresponding to the second phrase of the first period; an unstable one corresponding to the transition; and another stable one corre- sponding to the episode and last period In ef- fect, two tonal recapitulations can be identi- fied, one occurring before and one after the thematic recapitulation: the return of the submediant in m 138 and of the tonic in
KAROL BERGER Chopin's Ballade,
op 23
Trang 1019TH m 209 It is worth observing that there is rela-
CENUTSCRY tively little tonal instability in the piece; the
principal areas of instability are confined to the
transitions Otherwise, the discourse is remark-
ably reluctant to modulate and proceeds in
broad, stable tonal areas of either the tonic or
submediant Measured against the sonata-alle-
gro expectations raised at the beginning, the
most striking feature of this tonal plan is the
postponement of the main key's return until
the coda, that is, until well after the thematic
recapitulation had been completed This shift
of the tonic's return from the point where it
would coincide with the beginning of the the-
matic recapitulation to the beginning of the
coda, lending so much more drama to the point
of return, confirms and reinforces our sense of
the work's general shape as imbalanced and
end-oriented
A few harmonic details deserve additional comment First, the dominant preparation, the
essential harmonic content of the introduction,
emerges only gradually out of the opening HII6
(Neapolitan sixth) chord; its first elements show
up only in m 3, which emphasizes c3 and f#2,
the two indispensable pitches of the V7 chord,
itself fully spelled out only after the introduc-
tion is over in m 8 This beginning is harmoni-
cally as strikingly reluctant as the ending will
be strikingly emphatic.12 The specific harmony
Ab, which dominates the first three measures
and out of which the dominant emerges, may
hint at the importance the pitch A; will have in
the tonal plan of the whole, as it is the only
step of the submediant key missing from the
tonic G minor
Second, Chopin's already noted reluctance
to modulate is nowhere more evident than in
the transition between the two key areas of the
first period He not only follows the first phrase
with three appendixes, thus postponing the
moment when the tonic key will have to be
abandoned, but also continues to hesitate even
'2Moreover, it is reluctant not only harmonically but also
texturally, with the gradual emergence of homophony out
of monophony, and rhythmically, with measured rhyth-
mic differentiation of values emerging only gradually out
of the initial lack of metric definition and rhythmic differ-
entiation; on every level, mm 6-7 furnish the crucial me-
diating step
after the transition gets underway in m 56 Strictly speaking, there is no real modulation here, in the sense of an adequate preparation of the following key-only a chromatic sliding down of the bass from GG in m 56 through GGb in m 62 to FF in m 63, all of which is executed with such vacillation that until the downbeat of m 63 the music could still slide back easily to g minor As a result, when the new key, Eb major, appears in m 68, it is quite unprepared, and even the cadence in m 69 is not sufficient to stabilize it In fact, the tonal instability of the second phrase is initially so great that it is not even clear whether El or BL will be its key: the hint of a cadence in Eb at the end of the first incise in m 69 is immediately followed by another hint of a cadence in Bl at the end of the second incise in m 71 For a strong cadential confirmation of the second key, one must wait until the end of the second phrase
in m 82 Like the whole Ballade, the second phrase moves from an ambiguous, hesitant be- ginning to a clearly defined goal at the end The remarkable reluctance with which the main key is abandoned and the second one reached contrasts strongly with the normal Classical practice of an energetic drive toward the sec- ond key (although the concealing of a hint of what this second key might be in the first mea- sures of the work does have Classical prece- dents) The relative lack of a forward harmonic drive is compensated for, at least in part, by the seamlessness of the transition from the main
to the second key area and, again, this is in contrast with the normal Classical practice of placing a strong point of 'articulation before the second phrase Needless to say, Chopin's mas- tery of the mechanics of modulation cannot be
in doubt Rather, his aesthetic goals are differ- ent from those of his Classical masters At every step one discovers that he aims not for the Classical balance and symmetry of clearly articulated formal units but for an overall shape that projects, from an unassuming and reluc- tant beginning, a sense of a relatively seamless, gradual accumulation of energy and accelera- tion toward the inevitable, frantic conclusion Third, the longest section of tonal instabil- ity in the Ballade, the transition between the first period and the episode, represents a move- ment within the second key, rather than away
Trang 11from it The new key, BUb enharmonically no-
tated as A (I shall offer my reasons for this
interpretation later), is adequately prepared by
the dominant-function six-four appendix in
mm 94-105 (strictly speaking, its parallel mi-
nor, bb, is prepared), but the confirming B6l-
major cadence is reached only in m 107, after
the beginning of the next phrase on V7 of the
new key in m 106 (the already discussed
superelision); because toward the end (from m
118 on) the new phrase initiates a move back
to Eb and ends with a half cadence in that key
(or rather its parallel minor), the key of B6l is
never confirmed by a full cadence coinciding
with either the beginning or end of the phrase
The daring diminished-fifth relationship be-
tween El and B6 is certainly noteworthy, defin-
ing as it does the high point of harmonic insta-
bility in the work Chopin, who loved to flatten
the fifth degree of a chord, here transfers his
predilection from the level of chordal structure
to that of key structure
The thematic plan of the Ballade, like the
harmonic one, follows the sonata-allegro model
through the end of the first period, to the ex-
tent at least that it presents two thematic ideas
in two different keys, and alludes to them once
more in the last period, where the second theme
is recapitulated, although, against all sonata
precedents, in the second rather than the main
key This lack of correlation between the the-
matic and harmonic recapitulations and the
introduction of two new thematic ideas, C and
D after the first-period exposition, constitute
the two most striking features of the thematic
plan as measured against the sonata-allegro ex-
pectations raised at the beginning The two
features are related to this extent: that the sec-
ond theme is recapitulated in the subsidiary
rather than main key necessitates the continu-
ation of the discourse beyond the end of the
last period so that the main key can return in
the coda The introduction of a new theme at
the point where the tonic key returns gives this
point additional emphasis and importance and
confirms our fundamental reading of the over-
all shape of the work as focused on the final
goal Like theme D, theme C itself articulates
and emphasizes the arrival of the tonal reca-
pitulation: it has been noted above that the
Ballade contains two such points of tonal re-
turn, first to the submediant in m 138 and second to the tonic in m 209 This and because
C and D are the two new themes introduced after the first-period exposition further strengthen the correspondence between the epi- sode and the coda already noted on the basis of punctuation alone In fact,.the correspondence goes even deeper: both themes have a similar motivic construction The four incises of both themes, C and D (see fig 1), are filled with motivic content that could be labeled mmnn'- that is, in terms of the motivic content, the second incise repeats the first, while the fourth wants to repeat the third, but, unable to con- tain its energy, bursts its limits as if losing self- control in a giddy rush to the cadence Thus the episode takes on the appearance of a re- hearsal for the coda, and the whole sequence of events from m 166 on can be read as a rectifi- cation of the sequence of events from m 68 to
m 165, as if the search for a proper conclu- sion-the essential content of the work-did not get it right the first time and had to be repeated and corrected on second try.13
'3Needless to say, the similarity of the overall thematic plan, a-b-b1 (mm 1-67, 68-165, and 166-264 respectively),
to the form of the medieval ballade is fortuitous In choos- ing a name for the genre his op 23 was to inaugurate, Chopin was certainly inspired by the tremendous Euro- pean vogue for the poetic ballad among the Romantics, and in particular by that virtual manifesto of Polish liter- ary Romanticism, Adam Mickiewicz's collection of Ballady
i Romanse (Ballads and Romances) of 1822 There is no good reason to distrust Robert Schumann's testimony in this matter: "He spoke then [when he met Schumann in Leipzig on 12-13 September 1836] also of the fact that he got inspiration for his ballads from some poems of Mickiewicz" (Er sprach damals auch davon, dag er zu seinen Balladen durch einige Gedichte von Mickiewicz angeregt worden sei.) (Schumann, Gesammelte Schriften iiber Musik und Musiker, vol II, ed M Kreisig [5th edn
Leipzig, 1914], p 32) See, however, Christiane Engelbrecht,
"Zur Vorgeschichte der Chopinschen Klavierballade," in The Book of the First International Musicological Con- gress Devoted to the Works of Frederick Chopin, Warszawa 16th-22nd February 1960, ed Zofia Lissa (Warsaw, 1963),
pp 519-21; Gunther Wagner, Die Klavierballade um die Mitte des 19 Jahrhunderts, Berliner Musikwissen- schaftliche Arbeiten 9 (Munich-Salzburg, 1976), pp 42-48;
and Anselm Gerhard, "Ballade und Drama: Frederic Chopins Ballade opus 38 und die franzosische Oper um 1830," Archiv fir Musikwissenschaft 48 (1991), 110-25
See also James Parakilas, Ballads Without Words: Chopin and the Tradition of the Instrumental Ballade (Portland, Or., 1992), pp 26-27 For the date of Chopin's meeting with Schumann, see Schumann's letter to Heinrich Dorn
in Riga, written in Leipzig on 14 September 1836: "Eben
KAROL BERGER Chopin's Ballade,
op 23
Trang 12I have commented above on the relative lack
of tonal instability in the Ballade Similar and
closely related to it is the scarcity of genuine
thematic development in the piece-and the
little there is is confined to the two transitions,
just as the areas of harmonic instability were
Even many of the passages signaled by quota-
tion marks in fig 2 as developmental do not
quite live up to the Classical image of thematic
working: mm 91-94 and 189-94 merely con-
tinue to use the motif of the preceding appen-
dix to shift the key up by thirds; in mm 106-
26 the second theme is not so much developed
as restated with a modulatory change at the
end (thus, one might speak of a development
only after m 117) and with its character trans-
formed from the original sotto voce pianissimo
to the chordally reinforced fortissimo; and mm
250-64 do not so much develop as make refer-
ences to previously heard ideas Even mm 95-
106 and 195-206, which are as close to genuine
development as the Ballade ever gets, begin
with restatements of the main theme and only
later lapse into a brief and rudimentary the-
matic working But in these two passages, at
least, one cannot really speak of a thematic
restatement (as in mm 106-26), since too little
of the original theme is repeated and both the
expressive character and the function of the
material is transformed, reversed in fact, from
a thematic statement to a preparation for an
upcoming one (mainly through harmonic
means, as the whole passage is based on the
dominant-function six-four pedal) For the most
part, then, the work seems to state and restate
its ideas rather than developing them The rela-
tive lack of development of the second theme
in mm 106-26 and that this is the only subject
to be recapitulated give theme B the character
als ich vorgestern Ihren Brief erhalte und antworten will,
wer tritt herein? Chopin! Das war grosse Freude Einen
schonen Tag lebten wir, den ich gestern noch nachfeierte"
(quoted from Chopin, Korespondencja, I, 420) See also the
12 September 1836 entry in Schumann's personal diary,
quoted in Jean-Jacques Eigeldinger, Chopin: Pianist and
Teacher as Seen by His Pupils, ed Roy Howat, trans
Naomi Shohet with Krysia Osostowicz and Roy Howat
(Cambridge, 1986), p 268 Concerning Chopin's visit to
Leipzig and meeting with Schumann, see in particular
Gastone Belotti, F Chopin l'uomo, 3 vols (Milan and
Rome, 1974), pp 571-74
of a recurring refrain (Goethe observed in 1821 that "the refrain, the recurrence of the same closing sound, gives this genre of poetry [the ballad] its decisively lyrical character."14) To claim that Chopin consciously invokes the model of the poetic strophic ballad with refrain would probably be an over-interpretation Still, the idea should not be hastily rejected: it is plausible to claim, after all, that Chopin's next Ballade would explore this very model.15
III This relative lack of tonal instability and especially of thematic development might eas- ily give a superficial observer the impression of
a work more "lyrical" than "narrative" in its basic character, in which the temporal ordering
of the events and the logic governing their suc- cession matter far less than the dimensions of the work would lead one to expect But nothing could be further from the truth Motivic devel- opment is all-pervasive in the Ballade It ex- tends from the first to the last measure and does not have to be confined to the ghetto of the (nonexistent) development section But this development is conceived in terms different from those of the Classical masters, in terms more akin to the Brahmsian developing varia- tion than to Beethovenian thematic working
To be more precise: neither "development" nor
"variation" accurately describes Chopin's tech- nique These terms imply a distinction between
a model (motif, theme) and its elaboration (de- velopment, variation), between something origi- nal and primary, and something derived and secondary But distinctions of this sort are ir- relevant to the technique found in Chopin's Ballade It is evident that its thematic and motivic statements are interrelated, but they are not derived from one another: they are all equally original, or-what amounts to the same thing-equally derived from a single, extremely concentrated motivic source
'4"Der Refrain, das Wiederkehren ebendesselben Schlufklanges, gibt dieser Dichtart den entschiedenen lyrischen Charakter" (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,
"Ballade, Betrachtung und Auslegung," Werke, Hamburger Ausgabe, vol I [Munich, 1981], p 400)
'5See Gerhard, "Ballade und Drama," pp 110-25
19TH
CENTURY
MUSIC
Trang 13The narrative continuity in the Ballade is
established mainly by a tight network of motivic
interrelationships Some of these lie at the sur-
face and are easily noticed The ascending ar-
peggio that opens the main motif of the first
theme, A (m 8), echoes the ascending arpeggio
that opened the introduction, a (mm 1-3) The
motif of the first appendix that follows the
main theme, al, again opens with an ascending
arpeggio (m 36) In all three cases, the ascent is
followed by a stepwise descent The same con-
tour of an at least partly arpeggiated ascent
followed by a stepwise descent reappears in the
motif of the appendix to the second theme, b
(mm 82-83) Thus, when the contour reap-
pears in the appendix of the coda (mm 253-54
and 257-58), a backward glance is cast simulta-
neously at theme A and at motives a, al, and
b-that is, a final reference is made to the most
overt motivic link of the whole discourse Since
appendixes a2 and a3 have no genuinely me-
lodic content, consisting instead of an increas-
ingly nervous and agitated sempre piu mosso
figuration that gives way to the (again!)
arpeggiated chords of the transition, and given
that x, y, and z are melodically even more neu-
tral, of the melodically significant ideas of the
Ballade, only themes B, C, and D are free of
references to the just-identified motivic con-
tour Another, equally overt, motivic interrela-
tionship links theme C with the first appendix
of the main theme, al: compare the left-hand
motif in m 138 with the one in m 36 A much
less obvious link, but still close to the surface,
relates the theme to the introduction: compare
the right hand in m 138 with m 3 Thus, on
the surface at least, only themes B and D ap-
pear to be without significant links to other
ideas in the piece
Although these overt motivic links, how-
ever, do play a role in establishing connections
between individual ideas of the discourse, I
believe the motivic interrelationships and deri-
vations one discovers beneath the surface are
far more significant The narrative continuity
in the Ballade mainly relies on those The meta-
phor of what is on or beneath the surface stands
here for the distinction between an overt me-
lodic shape and its underlying structure that
can be revealed when this overt shape is re-
duced to its most fundamental pitches By be-
ginning to reduce the individual melodic phases
of the Ballade in this way, one discovers a narrative thread of astonishing logic running through the whole discourse, astonishing cer- tainly to this writer and, judging by the pub- lished literature, probably also to other Chopin critics
is its emphasis on C as the melodic beginning, strik- ing because the fourth scale degree (4), not being a member of the tonic triad, is an unexpected choice for the beginning of the melody from the standpoint
of Classical tonal practice It is surely worth noting that on the surface (mm 6-7) the accented melodic beginning, c2 (4), is directly related to gl (1) before resolving to bbl in a gesture that echoes the first descent from c3 to bb2 via g2 in m 3: the introduc- tion encapsulates what matters in a most economi- cal fashion Both the sigh motif and its specific ini-
'6In Frederick Niecks's words, op 23 is "full of sighs, sobs, groans, and passionate ebullitions" (Frederick Chopin as a Man and a Musician, vol II [London, 1888; rpt Neptune City, N.J., n.d.], p 268) More recently, Anatoly Leikin claims that the sigh gesture in op 23 evokes the seven- teenth-century operatic genre of the lamento Compare Anatoly Leikin, The Dissolution of Sonata Structure in Romantic Piano Music (1820-1850) (Ph.D diss., Univer- sity of California, Los Angeles, 1986), p 242
'7Chopin is as unconcerned with the hidden parallel fifths
between the top and the middle voices in mm 7-8 as he is with the overt ones in mm 6-7; see n 9 above
KAROL BERGER Chopin's Ballade,
op 23