franck piano quintet program notes haydn

Franck’s music leads, if anywhere among 20th century composers, to the Schoenberg of Pelleas et Melisande and the Berg of the Piano Sonata. They had met, briefly, in 1869 they admired each other, and the musical affinities between them were considerable. Of his contemporaries, Bruckner was the one whose style Franck’s music most resembled. But his music comes, essentially, from Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Liszt and Wagner. He was Belgian by birth and Parisian by training and residence (he became a naturalized French citizen in 1873). Of even more stylistic significance may have been Franck’s maverick status as a “French” composer. His equally domineering and conventional wife channelled him into the high-minded and fashionable world of oratorio. His ambitious and domineering father had wanted him to be a virtuoso pianist Franck was eminently up to this task, which may have diverted him from his ultimate des- tiny. Why it took Franck so long to realize his compositional maturity can only be a matter of speculation.

It is indeed a remarkable and beautiful piece, and it suggests a composer who had already “arrived.” And yet, Franck took almost another twenty years to find his mature style and to embark on the dozen or so masterpieces that have immortalized his name. Georges Bizet, on hearing the Prélude, fugue et variation, was astonished, and exclaimed to the composer that the piece was exquisite.

Franz Liszt’s comment about the set was unequivocal: “These poems have their place alongside the masterpieces of Bach”. César Franck composed his Prélude, fugue et variation as one of six works for organ, in 1862, his 40th year.

Franck piano quintet program notes haydn