Fantastic. I've been watching your videos for a while and it's so rare to find publicly available content that pairs depth of knowledge/expertise with enthusiasm and (informed) opinion. One most often encounters a lot of the latter without the former, alas!
Please continue with the series! The combination of your expertise plus the "casual" format, which allows your enthusiasm to shine through makes it unique and valuable.
Please, please do the second movement and finale. Would make an important collective work for students, etc. I absolutely love your analysis and how much the coordinated measure by measure highlights add. Beautiful work. Must take a lot of work.
Exactly, in Rachmaninoff's late Romantic style, “false harmonies” once deemed unacceptable in Renaissance music become acceptable, aesthetically pleasing, and even structurally useful, integral to smooth voice leading, adding beauty and formal utility to the music.
Please do the second movement, absolutely fabulous analysis. Your videos about Beethoven's 5th and 9th, and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde are both great, and would love to see more analysis of these works if possible. Thank you for providing such high quality videos!
I was listening to the 2nd Movement last night twice through! It nearly brought me to tears. It truly is a masterpiece of raw emotion. So incredible. Your analytical lectures Matthew are so interesting and engaging. Reminds of my music history prof. In grad school who also made his classes enjoyable.
Wonderful! I'd love to see you do a similar job on the Cello Sonata, which (in addition to its many beauties) seems to me to be similarly impressive in its thematic architecture.
I am lucky enough to be able to say that I can play this monumental masterpiece, my favourite piece of music ever. I am 19 years old and learned this alone a few years ago. Even at my young age, Rachmaninoff and his music and this Concerto in particular have influenced me a lot. I don't even dare and try to describe the amount of emotions this great man managed to evoke inside myself. He found his way into my heart and soul, using his music. He managed to comprehend the complex emotional being of every human, using the tools of music. He is holding a mirror so we can look back inside ourselves, into our hearts and souls. This is his music. So many memories that are connected to him... If interested, I uploaded some videos of me playing his pieces and this Concerto. Rachmaninoff's music comes when words aren't enogh to describe how I feel. This 'Rachmaninoff-feeling' makes me feel thankful for being a human, a human with emotions. Spasibo, Seryosha.
I’ve loved this piece for so long, and hearing your insights on the piece has really cemented my love for it. I would absolutely love if you could cover the second and third movement as well. Much love to you!! And thank you for your work!!!❤❤❤
Thanks for your wonderful analysis and for making this very accessible for those of your audience without formal musical training (let alone composition). I like how you explained about Rach's use of counterpoint and how it's really a "counter-structure" that reinforces the whole movement. It's truly brilliant. I do hope that you continue to break down the rest of this concerto.
Years ago I'd show up to my morning music theory class bleary eyed and zombified and leave an hour later feeling as though I'd never see the world the same way again due to some analysis of a brilliant piece. This video brings me back.
That was such a great breakdown of this piece! I have been listening to this concerto obsessively..along with Borodin strong quartet 2. Thanks for your wonderful insight!
I have determined from an objective point of view that your continuing this series is, indeed, a moral imperative. You are correct in saying there is a lot of drek out there, which is why I generally hit the like button even before I start the video.
Great content and very interesting! Thanks so much Matthew for your outstanding knowledge and enthusiasm on this great piece! Please keep up the great work 😊❤
Utterly brilliant. I've loved this concerto for 50 years and watching your superb, accessible and genuinely enjoyable analysis, I now know why. Please do the 2nd and finale.
Well done! I've long loved this concerto, but always felt a bit guilty about it. Your advocacy and analysis of what's going on makes it clear that I don't have to feel so sheepish. But honestly, despite my love of his melodies, his harmonies and the magnificent way he builds and releases tensions at climaxes, I've often found a tendency in Rachmaninov's music to be rather lacking in a coherent narrative: it sometimes seems "episodic", as if he thinks he needs a change of mood, tempo, texture at certain points, and it's not always convincing. I think it is especially evident in the 3rd movement of this piece. (Compare this with Beethoven who never fails to convince me with his structure and storyline.) But very much looking forward to future episodes on R2, so that you can convince me further.
There's no question that Beethoven is an amazing architect and he can build the most compelling structures imaginable. But even Beethoven can, on accasion, seem pretty diffuse - I know contemporaries of his were baffled by the 'formlessness' of the Emperor concerto, and the 9th symphony. Of course it turns out that these pieces are amazingly constructed but I can't blame listeners for finding them rambling and incoherent on first listen.With Rachmaninov there's a long critical tradition of finding his large forms unsatisfactory because they don't line up with how musicologists (who are used to analysing works in the Germanic tradition) think a piece should be structured. Rachmaninov is much closer to his mentor Tchaikovsky in structuring his large-scale forms around large expressive melodies - not something Germanic composers ever do - and so there is a different approach, more like a novel I suppose. So it's a very different kind of musical architecture but I would say equally valid.
I remember being on holiday and listening to this concerto. Even though I had heard to it many many times, I had never actually listened. When it got to that martial section in the recapitulation, I finally realised it was an amalgamation of the first theme and the cadential theme. Then I went back and realised how many times the cadential theme was referenced and I heard the celli playing the second theme in the buildup etc… The one section I couldn’t get was that Piu vivo section you described as ghostly. I’m finally relieved with newfound understanding!! I’m a young composer and pianist, and Rachmaninov is the reason I chose to pursue music. Videos like these are a great resource for people like me who could benefit from a bit of guidance. Keep going! Your work is very much appreciated.
One thing that I can't get my head around is just how absolutely different is the experience of sight-reading his 2nd and 3rd concertos. The 2nd is strikingly like "normal" music - a wad of Brahms, perhaps. There's barely any polyrhythm (only about 4 bars of it in the whole 1st movement), the chords and harmonies are all of a very traditional family. There's even quite a lot of repeated passages. (This is not to criticise the concerto itself - it is a wonderful and mesmerisimg creation. I love it to bits and back.) But the contrast with his 3rd concerto is so remarkable it's hard to see they came from the same hand. Sight-reading it requires an 11-worth of effort (and the neighbours need to be out). The complexity of the interlocking rhythmic/harmonic patterns is awe-inspiring and endlessly changing, there's barely a pattern that's repeated - let alone a passage. The piano solo introduction to the 2nd movement takes me until about lunchtime to sight-read.
Well they are clearly the work of the same composer! And in fact he's always absolutely identifiable (like all the greatest composers) from the earliest to the last pieces: the Symphonic Dances are as immediately recognisable as the C#m Prelude. But yes, the style changes and evolves with every piece, and the musical material grows in complexity and sophistication.
I discovered Rachmaninoff 2nd when I was about 10 or 12 as it was on the reverse side of two “Worlds Greatest Music” albums which had R-K’s Scheherezade, one of the most approachable symphonic pieces out there, on the obverse. (WGM was a subscription set of 24 albums of classical music aimed at American “middle-brow” cultural improvement in the 50s and early 60s.) Rachmaninov 2nd caught me. I have had it as a touchstone for more than 50 years, and it led me back to the piano, which has been a lifetime joy lo these 5 decades. Please continue. The second movement is one I can actually play more than 50%.
Absolutely correct about his hand in life. During thd bolshevik coup, he was redrafting concerto 1. to the sound of gunfire. Once he fled to Sweden, he had nothing, and played 32 gigs in less than two months. He could have pissed it all up the wall like his old man, but he worked like a soldier. His life, as many at the time, was far from easy, but he played the hand he was given, absolutely brilliantly, as you say.
For all my endless love of Rachmaninoff's second concerto, I still think an example of the perfect concerto is Charles-Valentin Alkan's concerto for solo piano from etudes in all minor keys. A fabulously beautiful, monumental piece, the second theme from the first movement is in my opinion the most beautiful melody ever written. Not to mention the crystalline perfect structure of the concerto, this concerto is a true manual of sonata form with double exposition, Alkan was a virtuoso master of the form Anyway thank you so much for the video! It's always a pleasure to watch your videos ❤
Rachmaninov is, unquestionably, one of my favourite composers. I still find the early C sharp minor prelude (opus 3, no. 2 - what happened to no. 1?) deeply moving, and I've lost count of the number of times I've heard it in often contrasting interpretations. I'm also very fond of the G minor piano concerto and wonder why it isn't more popular. I also love the symphonies, the Isle of the Dead and the Symphonic Dances.
One of my long time favourites made even better by your very insightful analysis. And your sight reading is astounding. This score is completely inaccessible to most pianists.
Excellent (as always). Carry on. Suggestion: You use a number of compositional terms (e.g. subject, phrase, exposition, development, etc) whose meaning is not evident to many of us. A brief video on this terminology would be helpful.
I believe that one can never understand Rach3 without going through Rach2 for many times, Rach2 is like the embodiment of beauty of adolescence or even youth then Rach 3 where it takes you deeper and deeper towards unprecednted feelings and emotions. absolute genius
Love it. Would be great to expand beyond the first movement. I would also like to ask you to consider his Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini which I listen to it once a day!
Check out “if this is goodbye” by Margaret Whiting awesome country song based on the second subject of the piece! Love how excited you get taking about music it’s contagious ❤️
As a (VERY) amateur composer, I learned so much from your analysis of this movement of Rachmaninov's second concerto with its amazing architecture. By the way, my father once told of having heard Rachmaninov perform in person; when the audience demanded the C# Minor Prelude as an encore, the poor composer looked disgusted and bored stiff.
@@themusicprofessor Dad was born in 1901 and lived in the Boston area, so maybe not so surprising! He also sang in the Harvard Glee Club when they did Beethoven's 9th under Pierre Monteux.
I love the influence on James Bond of Rach, the 17th variation of the Paganini Variations is ridiculously similar, as are multiple points in the solo piano repertoire. I also seem to remember a moment in the Rick, one of his early orchestral pieces of striking similarity. Obviously Rachmaninoff used some motifs repeatedly (like the Dies Irae) and I wonder if this influenced the James Bond theme. Equally likely that it just is chance, as you say the creativity of the Bond theme isn’t too sublime!
40:29 can anyone elaborate a bit more on this idea of chains of unresolving German Sixth chords as pioneered by Tchaikovsky? I'm seeing a chromatic descending bassline as Prof King illustrates this idea on the piano but I would love to hear more about how this works.
I'll take that one (since no one else wants to!) It's a harmonic formula that Tchaikovsky uses quite frequently in his work although he's too clever to use it as mechanistically as I did in that example! As an example, have a look at the fascinating and rarely performed 2nd piano concerto (ua-cam.com/video/nw5pn2QXyGQ/v-deo.htmlsi=7-lnY3M8TNzWy-Hx). The orchestra plays the chain of chromatic progressions I was talking about from 11:00 to 11:12. And during the piano cadenza, you hear an even more extended example from 13:27 to 14:15.
It's interesting how many times you mentioned fire in this episode, because I keep thinking of fireworks during many of the passages. Each note is like one of those little sparkly bits flying around on it's own, but together they form beautiful flowers. There's also this wonderful contrast between the first and second themes. The first theme is very earthly, strong and solid, very Russian; you can practically hear the boatmen paddling up the Volga. The second theme is heavenly, fluid, gentle and melodic; when the French horn plays it in the recap I think of a shepherd calling his flock back home. Yet when you break them down into subatomic particles they're really kind of the same, or is that just me? Anyway, I really appreciate this kind of analysis. They say if you've never studied plants there are only three kinds: if it's big is a tree, if it's small it's grass, and if it's in between is a bush. It's only after you've studied them enough to identify the individual species that you can truly appreciate their beauty. I think the same kind of thing goes for music, especially classical music.
isn't that the opening motif idea at 37:54 ? The F Eb D Eb C? To be honest that whole part sounds just like a prolonged and extended version of the opening idea.
Hi sir, great content as always. Have you thought about embarking on a longer journey on exploring some larger Bach pieces like Musical offering, Mass in b minor, Goldberg variations?
@@themusicprofessor In that case, looking forward to it Professor! As an enthusiastic Bach fan i found the lack of Bach content on your channel a bit sad :(
So refreshing to watch you. Will you do the magnificent Rach 3? I've just listened to the young Yunchan LIM play it and am totally in awe of this piece..
@donheckman5739 - Yes, LIM is very good, fast & accurate, but if you want a truly musical performance of the Rach 3, have you tried his compatriot Yeol Eum Son ?
He's wrong. He's a great musician of course but essentially attached to the German tradition - although he loved Liszt. I find the dislike of Rachmaninov among intellectual musicians very disappointing. It's as if the emotional power of the music is a barrier for them and they seem unable to perceive its exquisite technical skill.
*_Polyphonic_* ... when you pointed out the 2 Ds I thought of how I glitched playing through Bach very slowly as a very young boy. Yoiks, how can this absurdity sound so good?!! :-)
I don’t agree that class should play a role in assessing the quality of a work, but I do think it’s useful to acknowledge that the reason why so much great art comes from the upper class is because of the educational opportunities provided to them. You said the Bolshevik revolution deprived us of many great artists. I can agree to that, but also how many great artists have been lost to us due to the poverty and starvation of the masses, especially in early 20th century Russia under the Tzar at the time? Not saying you’re wrong on anything you said. Just food for thought.
Very good question. To some extent the same is true today! I genuinely think that the listening public tends to be more discerning and more reliable than the musicological community when it comes to appraising music, especially when audiences continue to admire pieces of music over a long period of time. Rachmaninov has been a favourite among audiences for over a hundred years but (as you point out) has always tended to be sniffily dismissed by critics and academics. The same is true of Tchaikovsky before him. It's important to remember that even Stravinsky and Prokofiev were huge hits with audiences long before critics and academics began to debate their significance. The giants of Jazz were also popular with audiences long before they received academic interest; the same is true of the Beatles, Hendrix, Bowie and other phenomena within popular music. Living composers like Steve Reich, Philip Glass, John Adams, John Williams have all been popular with audiences long before they were taken seriously by musicologists.
To be fair, when it comes to avant-grade composers of the time, it’s hard to view another composer unbiasedly when you’re in competition with them for resources and audience members!
I think I can answer that question. Many years ago I bought a book in France (where I now live) on the history of classical music by a well respected musicologist. When I got to Rachmaninoff I was shocked to read how dismissive he was of his music -- not because of its quality but because of his steadfast refusal to follow the contemporary atonal trends of his fellow composers, while harkening back to a bygone era, the romantic, which he obviously loved (Tchaikovsky was his favorite composer and it's undeniable that Chopin influenced his works for piano). But of course time has the last word in judging music. Case in point, J.S. Bach in his later years was likewise dismissed as old fashioned -- his own son even referred to him as "old wig" -- and yet he's now revered and is often considered the greatest composer of all time, while the composers around the time of his death are now mostly forgotten or rarely played (how popular is the galante style that prevailed in those years?). Similarly, many of Rachmaninoff's works like his preludes and his 2nd and 3rd piano concerti have become a staple of the contemporary repertoire while the overwhelming majority of atonal works of his contemporaries have fallen into oblivion. Many years ago I worked for about a year in the classical music department of a large music store in the US and during that time not a single customer ever bought a CD from those composers. My manager was even contemplating moving those CDs to a rack at the end of the store since nobody ever asked for them. Meanwhile the Rach 3 sold like hot cakes!
14:29 The bars before have the bass chromatically ascending. The bars after have the melody chromatically ascending. It’s a phrase balanced around the V-I movement that lands in A flat.
Did someone say that music was like architecture? "Architecture is frozen music" was apparently one of Goethe's. Good chance they're both right (and haven't visited Milton Keynes).
7:00 , Class does interferes in the quality of the music, a lot of autors shows how moral standards are based on noble or aristocratic standards. This is a long discution. We are talking about "superior" music, so, it needs the confirmation of its peers for that kind of recognition. I know it isn't the point of the video, but that fact must be considered.
I didn't deny that social position is a factor - of course it is, but the original question was posed by someone who didn't enjoy Rachmaninov because it seemed bourgeois and bombastic, and my point was that actually, when we appraise the quality of music, we need to lay class judgements aside.
Fantastic. I've been watching your videos for a while and it's so rare to find publicly available content that pairs depth of knowledge/expertise with enthusiasm and (informed) opinion. One most often encounters a lot of the latter without the former, alas!
Thank you!
I performed this work twice back in the day. Difficult but definitely lies under the fingers, as you say. Beautiful analysis. Thank you!
Please continue with the series! The combination of your expertise plus the "casual" format, which allows your enthusiasm to shine through makes it unique and valuable.
Please, please do the second movement and finale. Would make an important collective work for students, etc. I absolutely love your analysis and how much the coordinated measure by measure highlights add. Beautiful work. Must take a lot of work.
Same here, would love to see the second movement
Fascinating counterpoint analysis. Thank you!
Exactly, in Rachmaninoff's late Romantic style, “false harmonies” once deemed unacceptable in Renaissance music become acceptable, aesthetically pleasing, and even structurally useful, integral to smooth voice leading, adding beauty and formal utility to the music.
Please do the second movement, absolutely fabulous analysis. Your videos about Beethoven's 5th and 9th, and Wagner's Tristan und Isolde are both great, and would love to see more analysis of these works if possible. Thank you for providing such high quality videos!
Thank you @jeffhello!
Please do the second movement!
OK
I was listening to the 2nd Movement last night twice through! It nearly brought me to tears. It truly is a masterpiece of raw emotion. So incredible. Your analytical lectures Matthew are so interesting and engaging. Reminds of my music history prof. In grad school who also made his classes enjoyable.
Thank you!
I was really motivated by your last video's telling of the story. Rach's constant struggle to find his own confidence. Relateable!
Your enthusiasm is contagious, wonderful.
Rachmaninoff 4 analysis gets my vote.
Wonderful! I'd love to see you do a similar job on the Cello Sonata, which (in addition to its many beauties) seems to me to be similarly impressive in its thematic architecture.
You're opening my ears to depths in this concerto I'd never considered! Godspeed, and keep going!
Thank you!
I am lucky enough to be able to say that I can play this monumental masterpiece, my favourite piece of music ever.
I am 19 years old and learned this alone a few years ago. Even at my young age, Rachmaninoff and his music and this Concerto in particular have influenced me a lot. I don't even dare and try to describe the amount of emotions this great man managed to evoke inside myself. He found his way into my heart and soul, using his music. He managed to comprehend the complex emotional being of every human, using the tools of music. He is holding a mirror so we can look back inside ourselves, into our hearts and souls. This is his music.
So many memories that are connected to him...
If interested, I uploaded some videos of me playing his pieces and this Concerto.
Rachmaninoff's music comes when words aren't enogh to describe how I feel. This 'Rachmaninoff-feeling' makes me feel thankful for being a human, a human with emotions.
Spasibo, Seryosha.
These videos are gems ✨ I would love it if you did the rest of the concerto and analyzed other concerti in similar videos !
I’ve loved this piece for so long, and hearing your insights on the piece has really cemented my love for it. I would absolutely love if you could cover the second and third movement as well. Much love to you!! And thank you for your work!!!❤❤❤
Thank you!
Amazing video. I'm looking forward to the next one! Very passionate and well described explanations.
Thanks for your wonderful analysis and for making this very accessible for those of your audience without formal musical training (let alone composition). I like how you explained about Rach's use of counterpoint and how it's really a "counter-structure" that reinforces the whole movement. It's truly brilliant.
I do hope that you continue to break down the rest of this concerto.
Thank you for your lovely comment!
My favourite movement from my favourite concerto! I could listen to it all day!
Very enjoyable analysis.
I'm waiting for the next part. It has become a need for me to hear you discuss and analyze the beauty of Rachmaninov.
It will come soon but I have to admit that the next video will be about Mahler 5. I will come back to Rach 2 though...
I understand not much of the technical language but I love your enthusiasm ❤️
Years ago I'd show up to my morning music theory class bleary eyed and zombified and leave an hour later feeling as though I'd never see the world the same way again due to some analysis of a brilliant piece. This video brings me back.
That was such a great breakdown of this piece! I have been listening to this concerto obsessively..along with Borodin strong quartet 2. Thanks for your wonderful insight!
I have determined from an objective point of view that your continuing this series is, indeed, a moral imperative. You are correct in saying there is a lot of drek out there, which is why I generally hit the like button even before I start the video.
Love this, i've discovered your channel with the Rachmaninov series ! Continue please !
By all means, Prof. Can't wait for the other two movements. Great video!
Great content and very interesting! Thanks so much Matthew for your outstanding knowledge and enthusiasm on this great piece! Please keep up the great work 😊❤
Thanks
Thank you!
Utterly brilliant. I've loved this concerto for 50 years and watching your superb, accessible and genuinely enjoyable analysis, I now know why. Please do the 2nd and finale.
Thank you!
Again, thank you. Loved this and would love to see more, like the mentioned 2nd movement. Great stuff!!
I love the 2nd movement. Please do a video on that, and the finale while you're at it too! Thanks!
you should look at the second sonata! a masterpiece in thematic development and economic usage of motives, not to mention its genius harmony!
I love the 2nd sonata
This is an amazing video and analysis. Simply nothing like it anywhere else.
Well done! I've long loved this concerto, but always felt a bit guilty about it. Your advocacy and analysis of what's going on makes it clear that I don't have to feel so sheepish. But honestly, despite my love of his melodies, his harmonies and the magnificent way he builds and releases tensions at climaxes, I've often found a tendency in Rachmaninov's music to be rather lacking in a coherent narrative: it sometimes seems "episodic", as if he thinks he needs a change of mood, tempo, texture at certain points, and it's not always convincing. I think it is especially evident in the 3rd movement of this piece. (Compare this with Beethoven who never fails to convince me with his structure and storyline.) But very much looking forward to future episodes on R2, so that you can convince me further.
There's no question that Beethoven is an amazing architect and he can build the most compelling structures imaginable. But even Beethoven can, on accasion, seem pretty diffuse - I know contemporaries of his were baffled by the 'formlessness' of the Emperor concerto, and the 9th symphony. Of course it turns out that these pieces are amazingly constructed but I can't blame listeners for finding them rambling and incoherent on first listen.With Rachmaninov there's a long critical tradition of finding his large forms unsatisfactory because they don't line up with how musicologists (who are used to analysing works in the Germanic tradition) think a piece should be structured. Rachmaninov is much closer to his mentor Tchaikovsky in structuring his large-scale forms around large expressive melodies - not something Germanic composers ever do - and so there is a different approach, more like a novel I suppose. So it's a very different kind of musical architecture but I would say equally valid.
I remember being on holiday and listening to this concerto. Even though I had heard to it many many times, I had never actually listened. When it got to that martial section in the recapitulation, I finally realised it was an amalgamation of the first theme and the cadential theme. Then I went back and realised how many times the cadential theme was referenced and I heard the celli playing the second theme in the buildup etc… The one section I couldn’t get was that Piu vivo section you described as ghostly. I’m finally relieved with newfound understanding!! I’m a young composer and pianist, and Rachmaninov is the reason I chose to pursue music. Videos like these are a great resource for people like me who could benefit from a bit of guidance. Keep going! Your work is very much appreciated.
Thank you! Glad it was helpful.
Thanks!
Thank you!
Thank you so much! I love your videos, please keep going!
Merci beaucoup. I subbed while waiting for the continuation.
One thing that I can't get my head around is just how absolutely different is the experience of sight-reading his 2nd and 3rd concertos. The 2nd is strikingly like "normal" music - a wad of Brahms, perhaps. There's barely any polyrhythm (only about 4 bars of it in the whole 1st movement), the chords and harmonies are all of a very traditional family. There's even quite a lot of repeated passages. (This is not to criticise the concerto itself - it is a wonderful and mesmerisimg creation. I love it to bits and back.)
But the contrast with his 3rd concerto is so remarkable it's hard to see they came from the same hand. Sight-reading it requires an 11-worth of effort (and the neighbours need to be out). The complexity of the interlocking rhythmic/harmonic patterns is awe-inspiring and endlessly changing, there's barely a pattern that's repeated - let alone a passage. The piano solo introduction to the 2nd movement takes me until about lunchtime to sight-read.
Well they are clearly the work of the same composer! And in fact he's always absolutely identifiable (like all the greatest composers) from the earliest to the last pieces: the Symphonic Dances are as immediately recognisable as the C#m Prelude. But yes, the style changes and evolves with every piece, and the musical material grows in complexity and sophistication.
I discovered Rachmaninoff 2nd when I was about 10 or 12 as it was on the reverse side of two “Worlds Greatest Music” albums which had R-K’s Scheherezade, one of the most approachable symphonic pieces out there, on the obverse. (WGM was a subscription set of 24 albums of classical music aimed at American “middle-brow” cultural improvement in the 50s and early 60s.) Rachmaninov 2nd caught me. I have had it as a touchstone for more than 50 years, and it led me back to the piano, which has been a lifetime joy lo these 5 decades. Please continue. The second movement is one I can actually play more than 50%.
Heartwrenching! I feel it every time Matthew King grunts because the music is so overwhelming, hahaha. Thank you so much!
Yes this is lovely. Please continue!
Amazing! I hope you are able to make more!
Absolutely correct about his hand in life. During thd bolshevik coup, he was redrafting concerto 1. to the sound of gunfire. Once he fled to Sweden, he had nothing, and played 32 gigs in less than two months. He could have pissed it all up the wall like his old man, but he worked like a soldier. His life, as many at the time, was far from easy, but he played the hand he was given, absolutely brilliantly, as you say.
This is top quality!
Wonderful lecture, thank you.
For all my endless love of Rachmaninoff's second concerto, I still think an example of the perfect concerto is Charles-Valentin Alkan's concerto for solo piano from etudes in all minor keys. A fabulously beautiful, monumental piece, the second theme from the first movement is in my opinion the most beautiful melody ever written. Not to mention the crystalline perfect structure of the concerto, this concerto is a true manual of sonata form with double exposition, Alkan was a virtuoso master of the form
Anyway thank you so much for the video! It's always a pleasure to watch your videos ❤
I LOVE your videos. It’s been more than 30 years since I was in conservatory, and your videos take me back to my favorite analysis classes
1:12 John Barry was actually only the person who orchestrated the tune - the original was composed by Monty Norman.
Where did Henry Mancini come in?
Rachmaninov is, unquestionably, one of my favourite composers. I still find the early C sharp minor prelude (opus 3, no. 2 - what happened to no. 1?) deeply moving, and I've lost count of the number of times I've heard it in often contrasting interpretations. I'm also very fond of the G minor piano concerto and wonder why it isn't more popular. I also love the symphonies, the Isle of the Dead and the Symphonic Dances.
Rachmaninoff's music is truly exquisite! Being a cellist I love his Sonata.
Yes - a masterpiece!
@themusicprofessor I think Loki enjoys Rachmaninoff, as well.
I love the new thumbnail style 😆
Brilliant video
One of my long time favourites made even better by your very insightful analysis. And your sight reading is astounding. This score is completely inaccessible to most pianists.
Thank you.
Excellent (as always). Carry on. Suggestion: You use a number of compositional terms (e.g. subject, phrase, exposition, development, etc) whose meaning is not evident to many of us. A brief video on this terminology would be helpful.
Yes - I'll do that soon.
Once again, excellent video. Thank you so much. Can't wait for the others!
Yes, please look at the 2nd movement.
I believe that one can never understand Rach3 without going through Rach2 for many times, Rach2 is like the embodiment of beauty of adolescence or even youth then Rach 3 where it takes you deeper and deeper towards unprecednted feelings and emotions. absolute genius
Made my day
Concerning Rachmaninov, i always get the impression i listen to my teenage self. Everything sounds just so familiar.
Love it love it please keep going -- and please go back to Rach 1 also!!
Thank you!
Fantastic analysis, thank you 👌
Positively superlative video. Plug for something similar on Brahms’ 2nd piano concerto.
Love it. Would be great to expand beyond the first movement. I would also like to ask you to consider his Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini which I listen to it once a day!
Yes - one day!
Always loved this concerto. Mind-blowing to have you explain why it works. It’s Bach-tier engineering.
Fascinating, and a big help to freshen an over-played piece. It's not popular for no reason!
Check out “if this is goodbye” by Margaret Whiting awesome country song based on the second subject of the piece! Love how excited you get taking about music it’s contagious ❤️
Thank you!
I bet that dog can play piano better than me.
As a (VERY) amateur composer, I learned so much from your analysis of this movement of Rachmaninov's second concerto with its amazing architecture. By the way, my father once told of having heard Rachmaninov perform in person; when the audience demanded the C# Minor Prelude as an encore, the poor composer looked disgusted and bored stiff.
Amazing that he heard Rachmaninov live!
@@themusicprofessor Dad was born in 1901 and lived in the Boston area, so maybe not so surprising! He also sang in the Harvard Glee Club when they did Beethoven's 9th under Pierre Monteux.
I love the influence on James Bond of Rach, the 17th variation of the Paganini Variations is ridiculously similar, as are multiple points in the solo piano repertoire. I also seem to remember a moment in the Rick, one of his early orchestral pieces of striking similarity. Obviously Rachmaninoff used some motifs repeatedly (like the Dies Irae) and I wonder if this influenced the James Bond theme. Equally likely that it just is chance, as you say the creativity of the Bond theme isn’t too sublime!
40:29 can anyone elaborate a bit more on this idea of chains of unresolving German Sixth chords as pioneered by Tchaikovsky? I'm seeing a chromatic descending bassline as Prof King illustrates this idea on the piano but I would love to hear more about how this works.
I'll take that one (since no one else wants to!) It's a harmonic formula that Tchaikovsky uses quite frequently in his work although he's too clever to use it as mechanistically as I did in that example! As an example, have a look at the fascinating and rarely performed 2nd piano concerto (ua-cam.com/video/nw5pn2QXyGQ/v-deo.htmlsi=7-lnY3M8TNzWy-Hx). The orchestra plays the chain of chromatic progressions I was talking about from 11:00 to 11:12. And during the piano cadenza, you hear an even more extended example from 13:27 to 14:15.
Wonderful video!
Amazing video!
I’d love to hear a video like this about Ravel’s G Major concerto!
I will do one at some point. It's one of my favourite pieces.
(Insert Adam driver as kilo ren saying “MORE” gif)
Really enjoying these videos thank you
Do I like it? Well, it's bloody brilliant! Yes, please, more, more, more!
It's interesting how many times you mentioned fire in this episode, because I keep thinking of fireworks during many of the passages. Each note is like one of those little sparkly bits flying around on it's own, but together they form beautiful flowers. There's also this wonderful contrast between the first and second themes. The first theme is very earthly, strong and solid, very Russian; you can practically hear the boatmen paddling up the Volga. The second theme is heavenly, fluid, gentle and melodic; when the French horn plays it in the recap I think of a shepherd calling his flock back home. Yet when you break them down into subatomic particles they're really kind of the same, or is that just me? Anyway, I really appreciate this kind of analysis. They say if you've never studied plants there are only three kinds: if it's big is a tree, if it's small it's grass, and if it's in between is a bush. It's only after you've studied them enough to identify the individual species that you can truly appreciate their beauty. I think the same kind of thing goes for music, especially classical music.
Superb comment. All true of course.
isn't that the opening motif idea at 37:54 ? The F Eb D Eb C? To be honest that whole part sounds just like a prolonged and extended version of the opening idea.
Yes. Well spotted!
Very interesting thanks for highlighting the counterpoints. Rachmaninov wasn't indeed just about arpeggios and harmonic movements.
Hi sir, great content as always. Have you thought about embarking on a longer journey on exploring some larger Bach pieces like Musical offering, Mass in b minor, Goldberg variations?
I would love to. Some of my favourite music.
@@themusicprofessor In that case, looking forward to it Professor! As an enthusiastic Bach fan i found the lack of Bach content on your channel a bit sad :(
No need for sadness. He's a favourite of mine - but he gets a decent amount of coverage elsewhere.
So refreshing to watch you.
Will you do the magnificent Rach 3? I've just listened to the young Yunchan LIM play it and am totally in awe of this piece..
Yes, I hope to. It is of course harder to play and more complicated so it might take a while.
@donheckman5739 - Yes, LIM is very good, fast & accurate, but if you want a truly musical performance of the Rach 3, have you tried his compatriot Yeol Eum Son ?
Volodos, Bronfman, Gavrylyuk
More!!!!!!
I would love to have your views on his first piano sonata
Great
Did you notice the passage at the end of your video resembles the first movement allegro Beethoven’s Sonata Pathetique
Bl--dy hell indeed, what a piece and thrilling video thank you. Brendel was so wrong on Rach
He's wrong. He's a great musician of course but essentially attached to the German tradition - although he loved Liszt. I find the dislike of Rachmaninov among intellectual musicians very disappointing. It's as if the emotional power of the music is a barrier for them and they seem unable to perceive its exquisite technical skill.
11:58 this "second phrase" really catches me.
*_Polyphonic_* ... when you pointed out the 2 Ds I thought of how I glitched playing through Bach very slowly as a very young boy. Yoiks, how can this absurdity sound so good?!! :-)
I studied at G.S.M.&D. under Patrick Standford.
Thanks, I was no good, unlike P.S.
If architecture is frozen music, is music melted buildings?
I don’t agree that class should play a role in assessing the quality of a work, but I do think it’s useful to acknowledge that the reason why so much great art comes from the upper class is because of the educational opportunities provided to them. You said the Bolshevik revolution deprived us of many great artists. I can agree to that, but also how many great artists have been lost to us due to the poverty and starvation of the masses, especially in early 20th century Russia under the Tzar at the time? Not saying you’re wrong on anything you said. Just food for thought.
Nothing to disagree with here. Poverty, hardship, exploitation, poor education etc. are all responsible for depriving us of vital human contributions.
Musicologists of the 1930 tended to dismiss Rachmaninoff...yet the public loved him..why?
Very good question. To some extent the same is true today! I genuinely think that the listening public tends to be more discerning and more reliable than the musicological community when it comes to appraising music, especially when audiences continue to admire pieces of music over a long period of time. Rachmaninov has been a favourite among audiences for over a hundred years but (as you point out) has always tended to be sniffily dismissed by critics and academics. The same is true of Tchaikovsky before him. It's important to remember that even Stravinsky and Prokofiev were huge hits with audiences long before critics and academics began to debate their significance. The giants of Jazz were also popular with audiences long before they received academic interest; the same is true of the Beatles, Hendrix, Bowie and other phenomena within popular music. Living composers like Steve Reich, Philip Glass, John Adams, John Williams have all been popular with audiences long before they were taken seriously by musicologists.
Sour grapes
Age old impulse to analyze away any pleasure from something popular
To be fair, when it comes to avant-grade composers of the time, it’s hard to view another composer unbiasedly when you’re in competition with them for resources and audience members!
I think I can answer that question. Many years ago I bought a book in France (where I now live) on the history of classical music by a well respected musicologist. When I got to Rachmaninoff I was shocked to read how dismissive he was of his music -- not because of its quality but because of his steadfast refusal to follow the contemporary atonal trends of his fellow composers, while harkening back to a bygone era, the romantic, which he obviously loved (Tchaikovsky was his favorite composer and it's undeniable that Chopin influenced his works for piano).
But of course time has the last word in judging music. Case in point, J.S. Bach in his later years was likewise dismissed as old fashioned -- his own son even referred to him as "old wig" -- and yet he's now revered and is often considered the greatest composer of all time, while the composers around the time of his death are now mostly forgotten or rarely played (how popular is the galante style that prevailed in those years?). Similarly, many of Rachmaninoff's works like his preludes and his 2nd and 3rd piano concerti have become a staple of the contemporary repertoire while the overwhelming majority of atonal works of his contemporaries have fallen into oblivion. Many years ago I worked for about a year in the classical music department of a large music store in the US and during that time not a single customer ever bought a CD from those composers. My manager was even contemplating moving those CDs to a rack at the end of the store since nobody ever asked for them. Meanwhile the Rach 3 sold like hot cakes!
Someone knows his Rachmaninov 2. Did you use a tranquilizer on poor Loki?
Oddly enough, I don't know it as well as you think! Loki was very well behaved during this discussion. He's less well behaved in some other videos!
14:29 The bars before have the bass chromatically ascending. The bars after have the melody chromatically ascending. It’s a phrase balanced around the V-I movement that lands in A flat.
Bass descends oops! *
That dawgy couldn't be less Loki-like
He's quite Loki-like when he isn't on camera!
I always felt the name of the dog was spelled “low key” - oh well!
do the second movement
Did someone say that music was like architecture? "Architecture is frozen music" was apparently one of Goethe's. Good chance they're both right (and haven't visited Milton Keynes).
Actually it was probably the Goethe quote that I was thinking of.
7:00 , Class does interferes in the quality of the music, a lot of autors shows how moral standards are based on noble or aristocratic standards. This is a long discution. We are talking about "superior" music, so, it needs the confirmation of its peers for that kind of recognition.
I know it isn't the point of the video, but that fact must be considered.
8:03 , well, it shouldn't be, but music its a cultural product. Class is very relevant in a musical context
I didn't deny that social position is a factor - of course it is, but the original question was posed by someone who didn't enjoy Rachmaninov because it seemed bourgeois and bombastic, and my point was that actually, when we appraise the quality of music, we need to lay class judgements aside.
@@themusicprofessor We must remember that quality in art also need some kind of colective validation.