The story of Paul Wittgenstein, the classical pianist and younger brother of the philosopher Ludwig, is the greatest classical music movie never made. The virtuoso lost his right arm in WWI, but with heroic application and will, was able to carve out a career for himself as a one-handed pianist. Of course, coming from a privileged background, he was able to virtually create a new repertoire of left-handed piano music all for himself. He commissioned some of the greatest composers of the day to write works for him and they responded with some unusual masterpieces (Ravel’s Piano Concerto for the Left Hand, Prokofiev’s 4th Piano Concerto, Schmidt’s Piano Concertante and Britten’s Diversions). Strangely enough, he never really played any of them: the music was too modern and different for his tastes and his technique not quite strong enough: Prokofiev’s work for example was never played at all (though he did pay up).
Ravel’s Piano Concerto for the Left Hand, is the greatest work to be commissioned by Wittgenstein and the only one which has become standard repertoire. It is a mesmerising one-movement work, with a solo part so incredibly virtuosic that it sounds like four hands rather than one ! Wittgenstein rejected it initially, for its language and technical demands, but later performed and even recorded it to great acclaim. Ravel’s jewel-like orchestration is here disrupted, and thereby enriched by a seething anger and loneliness, which is very apt for the context of the work. It was to be Ravel’s own last great work: he suffered from Pick’s disease (possibly) and after this work was completed became unable to compose or indeed, even function: the hypnotic repetitive rhythms of this work and of “Bolero”, his most recognisable composition, are said to be a result of his neurological condition, a quite fascinating element of his genius.
Today, hearing the greats of the keyboard perform this work (some of them even arrange it for two hands), one would have to rate Wittgenstein’s recordings technically inferior; but perhaps no one could (or would want to) equal his unique physical connection with the music, perhaps no two-armed pianist can play it so transcendentally as someone with just his left hand to conquer the incredible demands it makes on the soloist.
Ravel Piano Concerto for the Left Hand
Love this piece !!
ReplyDelete