Béla Bartók

In 1925, Béla Bartók told interviewer Dezso Kosztolanyi that his first instrument was not, as might have been expected, the piano, but a drum he was given at the age of 2. At the age of 4, he was attracted to the piano, picking out Hungarian folk songs with one finger. These twin instrumental influences converged in one of the composer's most remarkable works, the Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion (1937), composed on a commission from the Basle chapter of the International Society for Contemporary Music. Bartók had previously explored similar instrumental combinations: the middle movement of the Piano Concerto No. 1, for instance, is a dialogue between the soloist and percussion. In this work, however, Bartók decided that, for purposes of balance, the percussion section was better offset by two pianos. The first movement begins with a long introduction over a soft timpani roll, the two pianos alternately presenting a twisting, chromatic theme punctuated by sharp bursts from the cymbal and startling trills and glissandi from the keyboards. A looming accelerando launches the main Allegro, a barbaric but high-spirited affair whose theme is uttered by the pianos in short-breathed phrases. The keyboard parts are characterized by much interplay and cross-counterpoint, while the xylophone and side drum provide vigorous propulsion. A second theme in quick, limping rhythm is presented in an episode framed by brief passages of drifting chords and timbres. A fugitive figuration in the pianos, highlighted by the triangle, leads to a grim, motoric march in 9/8. A climax featuring big, hieratic chords from the keyboards proceeds to a fugato treatment of the second theme, bringing the movement to an emphatic conclusion. The second movement is a characteristic example of Bartók's "night music," the dark nocturnal weft evoked by pointillistic use of cymbal, triangle and a soft, steady beat from side drum. The pianos present an inward, highly chromatic theme. In the ominous middle section, one piano plays dark, looming octaves while the other presents an urgent six-note motif based on a minor third (a recurrent figure in Bartók's music), joined by xylophone. The nocturnal atmosphere returns, this time colored by sharp cries from pianos and percussion and the return of the minor-third motif. The finale, marked by supremely intricate interplay among pianists and percussionists, features some of Bartók's wildest music. The harmonies become veritably woozy, reeling up and down chromatically as the pace quickens through a series of dance episodes in the composer's burlesque style. As the rhythmic impulse drives toward a climax, the music begins to fragment. Instead of the expected tutti ending, the movement quietly winds down to a final, limpid arpeggiated chord, a pure C major sonority, and an almost inaudible finger tap on the cymbal.