When did Ravel compose Gaspard de la nuit and what impressed him?
In 1908, Maurice Ravel entered a world of sleeping princesses, magical gardens and supernatural spirits. Impressed by the tales of Charles Perrault and Madame d’Aulnoy, he started work on his piano duet Ma mère l’Oye. His 5 beautiful fairytale vignettes, devoted to his buddies’ youngsters Mimi and Jean Godebski, take us from the hypnotic ‘Pavane de la Belle dormant’ to the vivid burst of ‘Le jardin féerique’.
There may hardly be a extra charming, harmless piece. But that very same yr Ravel’s ideas additionally took a darker flip. Gaspard de la nuit was the end result, a fiendishly laborious solo piano work haunted by unusual sprites, devilish creatures and the spectre of dying.
Gaspard’s three actions add as much as probably the most troublesome piano works ever written. Ravel had advised fellow composer Maurice Delage that he needed to create one thing extra stretching than Balakirev’s Islamey, a infamous virtuoso piece that had turn into a part of Parisian live performance life within the Eighties, and which was carried out by his buddy the Catalan pianist Ricardo Viñes. ‘Maybe I acquired somewhat carried away,’ mirrored Ravel.
The rating itself backs up the anecdote, even when Ravel did have a twinkle in his eye. To today Gaspard stays a peculiarly demanding take a look at for any pianist.
But though the work requires keyboard wizardry that Liszt may need baulked at, in a profitable efficiency all these notes needs to be serving the programmatic concepts. It’s no mere showpiece. Certainly, Ravel’s inspiration was particularly poetic.
In September 1896, the composer borrowed a ebook from Viñes: Gaspard de la nuit, subtitled Histoires vermoulues et poudreuses du Moyen age. This assortment of prose poems by the French creator Aloysius Bertrand was written within the 1830s, then revealed posthumously a decade later.
With 51 poems in six books, in addition to 13 ‘pièces détachées’, there was plentiful supply materials – together with a lot that appealed to Ravel and his love of the macabre. He selected three poems: ‘Ondine’, ‘Le gibet’ and ‘Scarbo’, every of which precede their respective actions within the first revealed model of his cycle, together with dedications to 3 totally different pianists: Harold Bauer, Jean Marnold and Rudolph Ganz.
Bertrand’s visions impressed one among Ravel’s best works, described by the pianist Alfred Cortot as ‘probably the most extraordinary examples of instrumental ingenuity ever produced.’ But, unusually sufficient, Ravel himself was no nice pianist, not like Beethoven (whose sonatas, to Ravel’s dismay, have been nonetheless all the craze in France), Schumann, Chopin, Liszt and Rachmaninov, who all had parallel performing careers.
Whereas Ravel was not horrible – he studied on the Paris Conservatoire, in spite of everything, and would play his Ma mère l’Oye in public – he wasn’t as much as the challenges of this new masterpiece. Thoughts you, he wasn’t proud of how Viñes performed Gaspard at its premiere in 1909; Ravel by no means let him give the primary efficiency of one among his works once more.
What’s Gaspard de la nuit about?
‘Ondine’ is the enigmatic opening motion (in luminous C sharp main), the legend of a water nymph who tries to entrap a human man. She declares her love for him, however when rejected disappears with malevolent laughter. Ravel had already explored watery results in Jeux d’eau (1901) and in ‘Une barque sur l’océan’ from Miroirs (1905), and in Gaspard he takes the concept even additional.
Out of the impression of shimmering water emerges an otherworldly tune; one among Ravel’s improvements right here is how melody and concord turn into inseparable. ‘I assumed I heard a obscure concord/casting a spell on my sleep/And close to me got here a murmur/As of songs interrupted by a tragic, tender voice’ learn strains from Charles Brugnot’s Les deux genies that be a part of Bertrand’s poem within the rating.
The central motion of the just about sonata-like triptych is a exceptional train in ambiance. A quote from Goethe’s Faust, ‘What do I see stirring across the gibbet?’ joins Bertrand’s phrases: is the unsettling sound we hear the north wind, a cricket, a fly, a scarab beetle, a spider? No, it’s the bell tolling for a hanged man, whose corpse is on the gallows because the sky turns purple within the setting solar. Octave B flats sound all through the sombre E flat minor of ‘Le Gibet’, a reminder of the inexorable inevitability of dying.
‘Scarbo’ takes us additional into the night time. This ultimate quantity, in darkish G sharp minor, is a portrait of a devilish goblin, who flits out and in of sight, hiding within the darkness, casting shadows within the moonlight. Ravel piles on the challenges: repeated tremolo notes, leaps across the keyboard that need to be completely even, lightning-fast passagework that must be executed at triple ppp, spooky chromatic scales in seconds. However then simply as softly as Gaspard de la nuit begins, the music indicators off with an insouciant flourish.
Finest recordings of Gaspard de la nuit
Martha Argerich (piano)
Deutsche Grammophon 479 4883 (1974)
In an interview in 1978, Martha Argerich defined how she got here to be taught Gaspard de la nuit. The younger Argentine pianist was finding out in Vienna together with her idol Friedrich Gulda, who was beginning to get pissed off with how lengthy she was taking on a Schubert sonata.
As a spur to motion, he requested her to organize Schumann’s Abegg Varations and Ravel’s Gaspard de la nuit for the subsequent lesson – in simply 5 days’ time. And she or he did. How did Argerich pull off the feat? ‘I didn’t discover it troublesome, as a result of I didn’t realize it was purported to be,’ she stated.
Like a baby who can cartwheel with out worry, she merely acquired on and learnt the music in entrance of her, with out worrying that Gaspard de la nuit was meant to contain sleepless nights (or maybe she was having fun with them – Argerich has talked of how she is nocturnal, liking to practise within the early hours).
The piece has turn into one among Argerich’s signatures, and there are great variations from all through her profession. You can fortunately begin with the primary outing on disc, recorded when she was 18 and just lately launched in remastered mono sound (Decca 479 5978). It’s silvery, refined, mercurial. Or leap to the newest, reside from the 2016 Lugano Competition (Warner Classics 9029583165), a now uncommon solo recording from Argerich, who in latest a long time has most popular to play with different musicians in chamber music and concertos.
It’s a spellbinding pay attention. In between there’s a volcanic reside recording from the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam in 1978. The uncooked vitality she harnesses is actually exhilarating. Ravel, nevertheless, may not recognise all of his notes and markings in that efficiency.
For a recording that retains a way of spontaneity however with the bonus of studio refinement, attempt the 1974 model recorded in Berlin for Deutsche Grammophon. The consummate ease she brings to the keyboard is compelling, liberating her to deal with interpretation.
Ravel purists may object to 1 or two liberties in tempo, however it’s laborious to not be swept up by her imaginative and prescient of the three actions. Her ‘Ondine’ is essentially the most seductive but weak of all pianists, temperamental too – the fortissimo ‘rapide et brillant’ unleashed close to the piece’s finish is pure adrenalin. With superbly balanced textures, ‘Le gibet’ is fateful, resigned, brooding. And her ‘Scarbo’ is as risky as one may ask for, encompassing an enormous dymanic vary, breathtaking method and a powerful feeling for this impish determine.
Steven Osborne (piano)
Hyperion CDA 67731-2
For those who’re after a Gaspard de la nuit that’s cooler in really feel, attempt Steven Osborne’s immaculate efficiency, recorded in 2010, that comes as a part of his traversal of the whole solo Ravel. The Scottish pianist strikes from the subtlest shadings of piano, pianissimo and triple piano, to orchestral-sized fortissimos.
Each motion is crystalline and transferring, however his ‘Ondine’ is especially particular. Osborne himself greatest describes it: ‘I really feel simply how pure and weak the melody is. It sounds much less like a seduction than a real enchantment for companionship.’
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Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli (piano)
Urania WS121329
There’s somewhat hiss within the sound on this 1959 recording, however it’s like trying on the statue of David by way of an outdated glass window: the construction and magnificence of the topic isn’t compromised.
The Italian pianist brings a sure the Aristocracy to Ravel, his well-known marble sound, and an unerring sense of readability and line. The aura of menace in ‘Le gibet’ and the relentless sound of the bell are particularly chilling. Michelangeli recorded Gaspard once more, a yr later, and that efficiency has the identical virtues.
Benjamin Grosvenor (piano)
Decca 478 3206
Gaspard de la nuit continues to fascinate the subsequent era of pianists. Anna Vinnitskaya has recorded a beautiful model; Lucas Debargue’s is wilful however fascinating. The British pianist Benjamin Grosvenor tackled the piece for his debut disc, recorded in 2011 when he was 18.
His ‘Ondine’ is superbly aquatic, and he finds finely-shaded layers of sound in ‘Le gibet’. Maybe his ‘Scarbo’ is extra Romantic, extra like a Liszt Rhapsody, than Ravel meant – the scampering outbursts are like rhetorical prospers – however it’s nonetheless diabolically good.
Learn our evaluations of the newest Benjamin Grosvenor recordings
And one to keep away from…
Tzimon Barto (piano)
An American pianist usually at residence with twentieth century repertoire, Tzimon Barto affords in his Gaspard de la nuit, first issued in 2007, about 30 per cent Ravel, 70 per cent Barto. ‘Ondine’ appears to be slowed down in quicksand, an fascinating interpretation struggling to interrupt free. The little hesitations he provides in ‘Le Gibet’ quickly really feel distractingly mannered, whereas ‘Scarbo’ is mischievous however far too idiosyncratic.
Major picture: Getty Photographs
