Opus Clavicembalisticum
Encyclopedia
Opus clavicembalisticum is a solo piano piece composed by Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji
Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji
Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji was an English composer, music critic, pianist, and writer.-Biography:...

, completed on June 26, 1930.

The piece is notable for its length and difficulty: at the time of its completion it was the longest piano piece
Longest non-repetitive piano piece
This page attempts to list the longest non-repetitive piano pieces along with approximate duration and the number of pages they cover.-Works that have been performed and/or recorded:* Jacob Mashak – Beatus Vir...

 in existence. Its duration is around four hours, depending on tempo. Several of Sorabji's later works, such as the Symphonic Variations for Piano (which occupy 484 A3 pages of manuscript — probably about nine hours of music, similar in duration to Frederic Rzewski
Frederic Rzewski
Frederic Anthony Rzewski is an American composer and virtuoso pianist.- Biography :Rzewski began playing piano at age 5. He attended Phillips Academy, Harvard and Princeton, where his teachers included Randall Thompson, Roger Sessions, Walter Piston and Milton Babbitt...

's work The Road) are even longer.

At the date of conception, the piece was possibly the most technically demanding solo piano work in existence due, for the most part, to its extreme length and arrhythmic nature, although later works by New Complexity
New Complexity
In music, the New Complexity is a term dating from the 1980s, principally applied to composers seeking a "complex, multi-layered interplay of evolutionary processes occurring simultaneously within every dimension of the musical material" ....

, Modernist and Avant-Garde
Avant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....

 composers, along with Sorabji himself, conceived more difficult pieces; it is in this particular area that Opus clavicembalisticum primarily receives its notoriety, and to this day is still highly regarded in this light.

Sorabji was inspired to compose the work after hearing a performance of Busoni
Ferruccio Busoni
Ferruccio Busoni was an Italian composer, pianist, editor, writer, piano and composition teacher, and conductor.-Biography:...

's Fantasia contrappuntistica
Fantasia Contrappuntistica
Fantasia contrappuntistica is a solo piano piece composed by Ferruccio Busoni in 1910. Busoni created several versions of the work including several for solo piano, and one for two pianos. It has been arranged for organ and for orchestra since the composer's death.The work is in large part a...

, and Opus clavicembalisticum is an homage to Busoni's work.

Structure

Opus clavicembalisticum has twelve movements, of hugely varying dimensions: from a brief cadenza
Cadenza
In music, a cadenza is, generically, an improvised or written-out ornamental passage played or sung by a soloist or soloists, usually in a "free" rhythmic style, and often allowing for virtuosic display....

, lasting only three minutes, to a mammoth interlude, containing a toccata
Toccata
Toccata is a virtuoso piece of music typically for a keyboard or plucked string instrument featuring fast-moving, lightly fingered or otherwise virtuosic passages or sections, with or without imitative or fugal interludes, generally emphasizing the dexterity of the performer's fingers...

, adagio, and passacaglia
Passacaglia
The passacaglia is a musical form that originated in early seventeenth-century Spain and is still used by contemporary composers. It is usually of a serious character and is often, but not always, based on a bass-ostinato and written in triple metre....

 (with 81 variations), requiring around an hour to play. The work's movements are set in three parts, each larger than the last:
Pars prima
I Introito
II. Preludio corale
Chorale prelude
In music, a chorale prelude is a short liturgical composition for organ using a chorale tune as its basis. It was a predominant style of the German Baroque era and reached its culmination in the works of J.S. Bach, who wrote 46 examples of the form in his Orgelbüchlein.-Function:The liturgical...

III. Fuga
Fugue
In music, a fugue is a compositional technique in two or more voices, built on a subject that is introduced at the beginning in imitation and recurs frequently in the course of the composition....

 I
IV. Fantasia
Fantasia (music)
The fantasia is a musical composition with its roots in the art of improvisation. Because of this, it seldom approximates the textbook rules of any strict musical form ....

V. Fuga II
Pars altera
VI. Interludium primum (Thema cum XLIX variationibus
Variation (music)
In music, variation is a formal technique where material is repeated in an altered form. The changes may involve harmony, melody, counterpoint, rhythm, timbre, orchestration or any combination of these.-Variation form:...

)
VII. Cadenza
Cadenza
In music, a cadenza is, generically, an improvised or written-out ornamental passage played or sung by a soloist or soloists, usually in a "free" rhythmic style, and often allowing for virtuosic display....

 I
VIII. Fuga III
Pars tertia
IX. Interludium alterum (Toccata
Toccata
Toccata is a virtuoso piece of music typically for a keyboard or plucked string instrument featuring fast-moving, lightly fingered or otherwise virtuosic passages or sections, with or without imitative or fugal interludes, generally emphasizing the dexterity of the performer's fingers...

, Adagio, Passacaglia
Passacaglia
The passacaglia is a musical form that originated in early seventeenth-century Spain and is still used by contemporary composers. It is usually of a serious character and is often, but not always, based on a bass-ostinato and written in triple metre....

 cum LXXXI variationibus)
X. Cadenza II
XI. Fuga IV
XII. Coda
Coda (music)
Coda is a term used in music in a number of different senses, primarily to designate a passage that brings a piece to an end. Technically, it is an expanded cadence...

-Stretta
Stretto
The term stretto comes from the Italian past participle of stringere, and means "narrow", "tight", or "close".In music the Italian term stretto has two distinct meanings:...


Composition and dedication

In a letter upon completion of the massive work, Sorabji wrote to a friend of his:

With a wracking head and literally my whole body shaking as with ague
Ague
Ague may refer to:* Fever* MalariaSee also:* Kan Ague, a residential area of Patikul, Sulu, Philippines...

 I write this and tell you I have just this afternoon early finished Clavicembalisticum... The closing 4 pages are so cataclysmic and catastrophic as anything I've ever done — the harmony bites like nitric acid
Nitric acid
Nitric acid , also known as aqua fortis and spirit of nitre, is a highly corrosive and toxic strong acid.Colorless when pure, older samples tend to acquire a yellow cast due to the accumulation of oxides of nitrogen. If the solution contains more than 86% nitric acid, it is referred to as fuming...

 — the counterpoint
Counterpoint
In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more voices that are independent in contour and rhythm and are harmonically interdependent . It has been most commonly identified in classical music, developing strongly during the Renaissance and in much of the common practice period,...

 grinds like the mills of God
Retribution (poem)
"Retribution" is a short poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:He derived this from the work of Friedrich von Logau who in turn was translating a hexameter from Adversus Mathematicos by the Greek sceptic philosopher, Sextus Empiricus, who was quoting an unknown poet.Its meaning is that divine...

...


The dedication on the title page reads:


To the everlasting glory of those few men blessed and sanctified in the curses and execrations of those many whose praise is eternal damnation.

Performances

There have only been a handful of performances of Opus clavicembalisticum.

The first was by Sorabji himself in 1930.

Pars prima was performed by John Tobin in 1936; this performance is noted to have taken approximately twice as long to perform as the score dictates. This performance, and its reception, led to Sorabji's ban on public performances of his works, claiming that, "no performance at all is vastly preferable to an obscene travesty". Sorabji maintained this ban until 1976.

The next public performance of Opus clavicembalisticum took place in 1982, at the hands of the Australian pianist Geoffrey Douglas Madge
Geoffrey Douglas Madge
Geoffrey Douglas Madge is an Australian classical pianist and composer.Madge performed long and arduous works, he has twice recorded Sorabji's Opus clavicembalisticum, one of the longest and most difficult works ever written for the piano...

. A recording of the performance was released on a set of four LP
Gramophone record
A gramophone record, commonly known as a phonograph record , vinyl record , or colloquially, a record, is an analog sound storage medium consisting of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove...

s, which are now out of print. Madge went on to perform it in its entirety on five other occasions, including once in 1983, a recording of which was released by BIS in 1999. This particular release is notable for its numerous technical flaws related mostly to pitch and rhythm. During several passages, entire measures of music are omitted or exchanged.

John Ogdon
John Ogdon
John Andrew Howard Ogdon was an English pianist and composer.-Biography:Ogdon was born in Mansfield Woodhouse, Nottinghamshire, and attended Manchester Grammar School, before studying at the Royal Northern College of Music between 1953 and 1957, where his fellow students under Richard Hall...

 performed the work twice, towards the end of his life, and produced a studio recording of the work.

Jonathan Powell
Jonathan Powell (musician)
Jonathan Powell is a British pianist and composer. He was a student of Denis Matthews and Sulamita Aronovsky. He made his performing debut at the age of 20 in the Purcell Room in London....

 has performed it on five occasions, and will begin a studio recording of the work after two more public performances of the piece.

The only other verifiable and complete performance of this work, in public, was given by Daan Vandewalle, although a number of pianists have performed excerpts, which are usually the first two movements. For example, J. J. Schmid performed part of the work at the Biennale Bern 03 and Alexander Amatosi performed the first movement at the University of Durham School of Music in 2001.

External links

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