The Nocturnes, Op. 9 are a set of three nocturnes written by Frédéric Chopin between 1830 and 1832 and dedicated to Madame Camille Pleyel. The work was published in 1833.[1]
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This nocturne has a rhythmic freedom that came to characterise Chopin’s later work. The left hand has an unbroken sequence of eighth notes in simple arpeggios throughout the entire piece, while the right hand moves with freedom in patterns of eleven, twenty, and twenty-two notes.
The opening section moves into a contrasting middle section, which flows back to the opening material in a transitional passage where the melody floats above seventeen consecutive bars of D-flat major chords. The reprise of the first section grows out of this and the nocturne concludes peacefully with a Picardy third.
Chopin composed his popular Nocturne in E-flat major, Op. 9, No. 2 when he was about twenty. Like much of Chopin's music, this nocturne is tinged with melancholy.
This popular nocturne is in rounded binary form (A, A, B, A, B, A) with coda, C. The A and B sections become increasingly ornamented with each recurrence. The penultimate bar utilizes considerable rhythmic freedom, indicated by the instruction, senza tempo (without tempo). Nocturne in E-flat Major opens with a legato melody, mostly played piano, containing graceful upward leaps which becomes increasingly wide as the line unfolds. This melody is heard again three times during the piece. With each repetition, it is varied by ever more elaborate decorative tones and trills. The nocturne also includes a subordinate melody, which is played with rubato.
A sonorous foundation for the melodic line is provided by the widely spaced notes in the accompaniment, connected by the damper pedal. The waltz like accompaniment gently emphasizes the 12/8 meter, 12 beats to the measure subdivided into four groups of 3 beats each.
The nocturne is reflective in mood until it suddenly becomes passionate near the end. The new concluding melody begins softly but then ascends to a high register and is played forcefully in octaves, eventually reaching the loudest part of the piece, marked fortissimo. Tension increases dramatically as the crescendo brightly moves up to the long trill. After a brilliant trill-like passage, the excitement subsides; the nocturne ends calmly.
Muse's "+Collateral Damage" is based on Nocturne in E-flat Major, using it as an additional end piano sonata to the song "United States of Eurasia". The piece was accompanied by sounds of children laughing and jet fighters.[3]
It is in the ternary form A-B-A. The first section is set to allegretto. The second contrasting section, Agitato in B minor, is a very dramatic one with a combined melody & counter-melody in the right hand and continuous 8th note arpeggios in the left, which requires an amount of virtuosity. The piece is full of coloratura ornaments, and ends with a wide chord in the left hand accompanied with right hand triplets in a high octave to lead to a legatissimo smorzando adagio (senza tempo).
| Book: Frédéric Chopin | |
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