Richibi’s Weblog

     “Petrarch“ (c.1450) 

           Andrea del Castagno

                     ___________

                                    for John, who would’ve 

                                                       been 60 today

though the suite might’ve started with

Bach’s string of dance pieces in the 

early 18th Century, it becomes evident 

during the 19th Century, after a lapse 

of nearly 100 years, while it fell into 

disfavour, that its resurrection as a 

valid musical form might’ve kept the 

original structure, which is to say its 

several separate parts to make up a 

whole, its movements, but that it 

now was serving a different purpose 

where music had, through to the early

Romantic Period, followed dance 

rhythms, or variations of tempo,

adagio, andante, allegro, and the like,

it now presented itself as a background

for settings, be it ballets, as in

Tchaikovsky’s, plays, as in Edvard

Grieg’s celebrated , “Peer Gynt Suite“,

after Ibsen‘s eponymous play,

specific locations, as in Debussy’s

“Children’s Corner“, or more  

expansively, both geographically

and in its compositional length,

these very “Années de pèlerinage” 

of Liszt

this is in keeping with the exploration

of consciousness of that era, which 

would lead to not only Impressionism, 

but to Freud, and the others, and the 

development of psychoanalysis

you’ll note that music seems much 

more improvisational in Liszt than in

Chopin, or Beethoven, prefiguring

already even jazz, more evocative,

less emotional, more personal, not

generalized, idiosyncratic, a direct

development of the newly acquired

concept of democracy, one man, at

the time, one vote, one, indeed, 

voice, however individual, however 

even controversial 

listen, for instance, to Liszt’s “Années

de pèlerinage”, 2nd Year, Italy 

   1. Sposalizio

   2. Il penseroso

   3. Canzonetta del Salvator Rosa 

   4. Sonetto 47 del Petrarca 

   5. Sonetto 104 del Petrarca 

   6. Sonetto 123 del Petrarca 

   7. Après une lecture de Dante: Fantasia Quasi Sonata 

today you can listen to suites 

from famous films, for instance 

“Blade Runner“, the beat, in 

other words, goes on

but note the renovations, find them, 

I dare you, you’ll be surprised at 

your unsuspected perspicacity

listen

R ! chard