Program Notes: Rachmaninov Piano Concertos Nos. 1–4

When we listen to a composer’s decades-long output, some of us tend to look for signs of “maturity.” It tailors what we listen for: harmonic surprises; melodic complexity; eschewing of mainstream trends; a focus on stylistic originality. This narrative has been applied to many composers, but it’s not as helpful with pinpointing stylistic shifts and continuities as we may think. Instead of engaging with a composer’s work as an example of a one-direction trajectory, what would happen if we listened with the understanding that there are multiple starting points in a creative process? Points creating paths that circle, diverge and overlap with one another, sometimes many years apart. The Seattle Symphony’s programming of Sergey Rachmaninov’s four piano concertos, composed between 1891 and 1941, provides such an opportunity.  

Born into Russian aristocracy in 1873, Rachmaninov was immersed in the conservatory training of late-19th century Europe, studying standard music forms, genres, and diatonic and chromatic harmonies. His career trajectory coincided with shifts in aesthetic traditions: some of his contemporaries (like Claude Debussy, Arthur Schoenberg and Igor Stravinsky) looked to shed the weight of genre expectations; others (Harry T. Burleigh, Florence Price and Samuel Barber among them) adhered to the genre while bringing stylistic and aesthetic traditions outside of classical music into play. While some saw him as outmoded, Rachmaninov’s use of late-Romantic features and characteristics — grand scale, complex harmonies and high emotional drama — would be put to effective use in his four concertos for piano, creative decisions that remain beloved by audiences and performers to this day.  

Rachmaninov completed his Piano Concerto No. 1 in F-sharp minor, Op. 1, in 1891 while a student at the Moscow Conservatory. Revised in 1917, the Concerto is built around and sustained by sequential development of short motives within thematic episodes. The first movement opens with a punctuated rhythm in the brass before the soloist enters with descending chords, leading to the main theme in the orchestra. This theme is restated by the soloist, segueing into a new motivic section. The orchestra moves between supportive and participatory playing, setting the scene for new sections or passing a motive back and forth with the soloist to increase drama. The second movement is rhapsodic and improvisatory, focused on the lyrical and emotive capabilities of the piano; the orchestra moves placidly underneath, slowly emerging towards the end to buoy the soloist’s ascending and descending sequences and scalar passages. The third movement most effectively highlights Rachmaninov’s lyrical strengths with its arresting second theme.  

The early stages of composition for his Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, Op. 18 coincided with the less-than stellar 1897 premiere of his First Symphony. Depressed and questioning the viability of his ideas, Rachmaninov sought reassurance from friends and respected elders. Meetings with his idol, Leo Tolstoy, did not help, but through therapy, he rediscovered his creative focus and revisited his Second Piano Concerto. He debuted the second and third movements in December of 1900, as the first movement was still in progress. He performed the work in its entirety in 1901 with the Moscow Philharmonic Society. While this piece would become one of his most beloved and performed works, it did not negate moments of personal dissatisfaction, as he expressed in a letter to his friend and fellow composer, Nikita Morozov:  

“You are right … I have just played through the first movement of my concerto, and only now has it suddenly become clear to me that the transition from the first theme to the second is no good at all ... To my mind the whole movement is spoilt, and from this moment it is absolutely repulsive to me. I’m in despair! And why on earth did you have to bother me with your analysis five days before performance?”  

The C-minor Concerto opens with soft, ominous chords in the piano. The foreboding main theme is introduced by the orchestra, which continues its supportive and proactive roles as the soloist oscillates between virtuosic runs, leaps and lyrical passages. Rachmaninov nestles thematic episodes within the first movement’s three main sections, allowing him to introduce new material and reintroduce the familiar. The second movement’s main theme is one of Rachmaninov’s most memorable melodies. It is spun out into a development section connecting to a beautiful, melancholic coda that ebbs and flows to a soft question mark in the piano. The third movement opens with an agitated main theme. However, the lyrical second theme, built on B-flat with lowered third, sixth and seventh scale degrees in the melodic line, is the true heart of this movement. Its restatement in C-major is an epic arrival for the entire movement, taking the Concerto to an exuberant conclusion.  

With this concerto, audiences and critics alike would continue to look to Rachmaninov as an example of the exciting and wondrous possibilities Romanticism could provide, a style not quite as outmoded as some of his contemporaries believed.  

Seventeen years separate Rachmaninov’s last two piano concertos; Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor, Op. 30 was completed in 1909 while his Piano Concerto No. 4 in G minor, Op. 40 came to fruition in 1926. Both works showcase the stylistic staples of Rachmaninov’s concerto writing while maintaining distinct characters. They also emphasize that composing is not a straight line, but one of reevaluation and revision. 

Rachmaninov completed his Third Piano Concerto in time for his debut American tour. He performed it twice with Walter Damrosch and the New York Symphony Orchestra in November 1909, and once with Gustav Mahler and the New York Philharmonic in January of 1910. While his Second Piano Concerto convinced audiences and critics of his skills as a concerto writer, the Third solidified his reputation as a significant composer and became a repertoire staple for classical piano. It is renowned for its technical difficulty (Rachmaninov had a 14-note finger span) and evocative of some of the favored characteristics of late Romantic classical music: grand scale, strong emotion and harmonic complexity.  

One of Rachmaninov’s many compositional strengths existed in his orchestration. Whether the texture is sparse (rarely) or thick (mostly), the themes and motives of importance are clearly indicated. Some criticism of late Romanticism can be found in the very features that came to define it: the pieces were too long, the textures too dense, the harmonies too complex. Rachmaninov’s different textural settings — polyphony with one or two parts carrying the main theme, a soloist and orchestral section playing snippets of a main or secondary theme, and a main theme in the orchestra with subdued scalar passages in the solo — are three structural approaches he used to avoid sonic and narrative muddiness.  

Rachmaninov applied these different textures in the Third Piano Concerto. Each movement takes advantage of a different virtuosic, emotive and collaborative element of piano playing. The first movement features a standard-length exposition, long development, and truncated recapitulation with coda. His use of melodic fragmentation, leaps, chordal sequences, and repetition ensure clarity of the movement’s narrative direction without sacrificing opportunities for playing with expectation. The second movement combines Rachmaninov’s love of the lyrical and technical; the orchestra retains its major role as supporter and collaborator as the soloist moves through rhapsodic passage ranging from intimate to extroverted. While the entire concerto is viewed as a successful example of pianistic Romanticism, it is in the third movement where Rachmaninov makes use of extravagant lyricism (e.g. the triumphant theme in the coda), confident virtuosity (e.g. a fast and impish main theme), and extension of phrases to achieve a greater scene of scale.   

His Fourth Piano Concerto, also his last, took even longer to finish than his Second, and required revisions like his First. He began the work in 1914, but working on the Concerto was the least of his priorities due to political instabilities of the next few years — The Great War, the Russian Revolution — and his relocation with family to New York City. He completed the first version in 1926, but despite revisions in 1928 and 1941, his Fourth was the most poorly received of Rachmaninov’s piano concertos  

Despite the negative critical reception, the Fourth has all the typical stamps of a Rachmaninov concerto. Shorter in length than his Third, the first movement evokes humble confidence, opening with a triumphant and joyful brass theme followed by a main theme that shares aspects with the Second Piano Concerto’s main theme. The secondary theme is led by the soloist with supportive lyrical passages in the orchestra before moving to an angular, frenetic section featuring scalar sequences in the piano. An expansive theme introduced by the orchestra recalls the epic sweep of film scores from the 1930s and ’40s; the soloist assumes that style in a more intimate framing before an abrupt shift to intense chords, quickly bringing the movement to a close.  

The opening section of the second movement features fragmented quotation of the main theme. Passing between soloist and sections of the orchestra, it builds to a new section with dissonant, angry chords before resettling into the languid, melancholy main theme. The final movement once again features virtuosic scalar passages with an angular, jagged quality that inject a new character into Rachmaninov’s stylistic palette. The movement’s sections vary from cheeky, contemplative and excited to epically lyrical. The final section recalls the textural build used in his Second: punctuated notes in the solo part that grow to longer motives and thicker textures, culminating in a high emotional peak. While the least popular of his piano concertos, the Fourth showcases the stylistic elements that helped Rachmaninov become and remain one of the most beloved composers for classical piano.  

A. Kori Hill © 2023