Sonata in E minor, Op.7 (Grieg)

Early on in his career, before discovering his talents for miniatures, songs, and incidental music, Edvard Grieg tried his hand at more traditional concert music in its then-rigidly codified styles and forms. Indeed, the list of Grieg's almost entirely unplayed early compositions reads like a text of essential concert music varieties: a symphony, some chamber sonatas, an abandoned string quartet, a piano concerto. The first of all these standard concert works to be completed was this sonata (1865, published a year later, and revised in 1887), a work so obscure that one can dig through book after book without catching a single reference to it, and plunder shelf after shelf without finding either a copy or a recording; and yet, for all that obscurity and Grieg's admitted discomfort with such works, the sonata is, in its own way, quite an appealing work, like a colourful and clever, but admittedly underdeveloped child.

The sonata has four movements with the following tempo markings:
1. Allegro moderato (moderately fast) in 2/4 time.
2. Andante molto (very slow) in common time, 4/4.
3. Alla Menuetto, ma poco più lento (a little slower than minuet speed) in 3/4.
4. Molto allegro (very fast) in 6/8.

The first of its four movements rides forth on a vital theme (see below) that seems to want to plumb the very depths of the earth . If the figurations that surround it, and the manner in which it is built up over the course of the movement, seem somewhat juvenile, the same might be said of many a more-famous sonata composer's earliest efforts.
The second movement has just a touch of the same time-stands-still magic that graces the slow movement of the composer's Piano Concerto, written some three years later.
The third movement may be uncomfortably heavy-handed, but its peculiar Nordic flavour and odd dissonances at least add novelty.
The finale gallops forth in 6/8 meter and has a chorale-like second subject which, during the recapitulation, achieves the happy E major in which the sonata closes.

In the 19th century, and before, there was a tradition in many countries to use the mother's surname, which would be lost upon marriage, as the second name of any child, hence Hagerup in Grieg's full name. This is salient for the following reason, namely: the first movement uses a technique probably most famously used by Bach and Shostakovich, that is, his own name, more precisely his initials E-H-G (H being the German name for note B), begins the melody in the first two bars, which is reiterated in octaves and even echoed by the left hand in bars 14 and 15. These three notes also, conveniently, form the three notes of the tonic key, in first inversion! They seem perfect for the main theme of this movement.

The work was Grieg's only piano sonata and it was dedicated to the Danish composer Niels Gade. In 1903 Grieg recorded two movements of his sonata. The first complete recording was that made on 20 April 1921 by the Australian pianist Una Bourne (1882–1974).

GlynGlynn, alias GB, realiser.
Please feel free to leave any comments, be they good, bad, or indifferent as to whether the piece, or the performance, moved you in any way whatsoever!

(Since music is an aural art, and not a visual one, it is best to listen to these pieces, and other artists performances, with eyes closed, so as to be able to listen intently as to how the music is portrayed).