John Corigliano

John Corigliano's Etude Fantasy was premiered by James Tocco in 1976. It comes from the end of Corigliano's first stylistic period, which reflected an outgrowth of the American sounds of Samuel Barber, Aaron Copland, Roy Harris, and William Schuman. True to its name, the Etude Fantasy features movements designed to test the pianist's skill, linked by a tone row and a melodic idea that are introduced in the first etude and developed in a free, episodic manner through the rest of the work. The result is a work which showcases the composer's keen ability to unify diverse material as much as it showcases the pianist's keyboard prowess. Conveniently enough, the first six notes of the work introduce the piece's tone row; after a little virtuoso figuration, the cool, reserved melodic germ follows. Both rely on the interval of a second, which is also developed throughout the work. The first etude is subtitled "For the Left Hand Alone," and indeed it is; such are the demands placed upon the pianist that one never misses the right hand. After the initial melodic statement, the virtuoso figurations accompanying the tone row return, followed by a gradual slowing down which finally introduces the right hand, playing a quiet chromatic scale over a gently pulsing left-hand accompaniment. The "Legato" etude, which tests the pianist's ability to play at a quiet yet sustained melodic line while the two hands descend the keyboard and cross each other frequently. The atmosphere created here is magical. The title of the next etude, "Fifths to Thirds," refers to the intervallic contraction from a fifth, played with the thumb and little finger, to a third, played with the index and ring fingers. Corigliano whips up a playful, frothy scherzo-like movement here, out of which an ebullient melody eventually emerges, all without straying too far from the basic device. As a contrast, "Ornaments," the next etude, brings back material from the first etude, cloaks it in trills, grace notes, tremolos, glissandos, and roulades, and eventually charges it into a demonic scherzando, pausing only to restate the tone row with appropriate ornaments. The music immediately regains its momentum and reaches a thunderous climax. Out of the climax's aftermath grows the fifth etude, a study in melody. The pianist's job here is to isolate the melodic line from the filigree that surrounds it. Material from the first and second etudes is developed in a desolate, brooding atmosphere. The work ends with a statement of the tone row in reverse, accompanying a quiet two-note ostinato. Corigliano has imagined a new form and given a good account of its possibilities here; his Etude Fantasy is exciting and arresting.