Sergei Rachmaninoff

Born: April 1, 1873, Oneg (near Novgorod), Russia
Died: March 28, 1943, Beverly Hills, California

Concerto No. 3 in D Minor for Piano and Orchestra, Op. 30

• Composed: 1909
  
• Premiere: November 28, 1909 in New York, with the composer as soloist and Walter Damrosch conducting
• CSO Notable Performances: 
  • First: March 1928, Fritz Reiner conducting; Vladimir Horowitz, piano
  • Most Recent: November 2022, Elim Chan conducting; Conrad Tao, piano
• Instrumentation: solo piano, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, bass drum, crash cymbals, snare drum, suspended cymbals, strings
• Duration: approx. 39 minutes

The worlds of technology and art sometimes brush against each other in curious ways. In 1909, it seems, Sergei Rachmaninoff wanted one of those new mechanical wonders—an automobile. And thereupon hangs the tale of his first visit to America.

The impresario Henry Wolfson of New York arranged a 30-concert tour for the 1909–10 season for Rachmaninoff so he could play and conduct his own works in a number of American cities. Rachmaninoff was at first hesitant about leaving his family and home for such an extended overseas trip, but the generous financial remuneration was too tempting to resist. With a few tour details still left unsettled, Wolfson died suddenly in the spring of 1909, and the composer was much relieved that the journey would probably be cancelled. Wolfson’s agency had a contract with Rachmaninoff, however, and during the summer finished the arrangements for his appearances so that the composer–pianist–conductor was obliged to leave for New York as scheduled. Trying to look on the bright side of this daunting prospect, Rachmaninoff wrote to his long-time friend Nikita Morozov, “I don’t want to go. But then perhaps, after America I’ll be able to buy myself that automobile.... It may not be so bad after all!” It was for the American tour that Rachmaninoff composed his Third Piano Concerto. 

Rachmaninoff’s hectic schedule during the early months of 1909 prevented him from beginning the new piece until June, when he arrived at his country retreat at Ivanovka, a village north of the Black Sea, but then he worked feverishly on the score all summer, adding the finishing touches when he returned to Moscow in September. He did not have time, however, to get the demanding solo part into his fingers before he left for the United States, so he took along a silent practice keyboard and labored over it in his stateroom throughout the crossing. The unorthodox method worked, and he was ready for the premiere on November 28, 1909 with Walter Damrosch and the New York Symphony Orchestra, but he vowed never to use the contraption again.

Rachmaninoff was, as he had expected, depressed during his inaugural American tour, though the impressions he made on his audiences were so strong that he was invited to become permanent conductor of both the Boston and Cincinnati Symphony Orchestras, offers he firmly refused so that he could return to his beloved homeland. Eight years later, however, as fate would have it, he was forced to leave Russia when his estate and family fortune were swallowed by the Revolution, and he settled in the United States for good in 1917—his annual cross-country tours were a hallowed American institution for the next two decades. The Concerto No. 3, the work with which he introduced himself to American audiences, remained an integral and constantly requested part of his repertory throughout his career.

The concerto consists of three large movements. The first is a modified sonata-allegro form that begins with a theme recalled in the later movements. This opening melody, announced in stark octaves over a sparse accompaniment, bears a strong resemblance to the plaintive chants of the Russian Orthodox Church, and Joseph Yasser, organist, musicologist and friend of Rachmaninoff, asked him if there was any deliberate relationship between the two. Rachmaninoff denied that the theme was based on liturgical or folk music, but he maintained that he had not composed it consciously; it had, he said, “created itself.” In 1969, Yasser discovered a chant used in Kiev that closely parallels Rachmaninoff’s melody. He speculated that the composer may have heard it as a boy, and, when pressed with the need for thematic material for the Third Concerto, the ancient strain rose up from the recesses of his memory. Whatever its source, the haunting melody sets perfectly the concerto’s mood of somber intensity. The espressivo second theme is presented by the pianist, whose part has, by this point, abundantly demonstrated the staggering technical challenge this piece offers to the soloist, a characteristic Rachmaninoff had disguised by the simplicity of the opening. The development section is concerned mostly with transformations of fragments from the first theme. A massive cadenza, separated into two parts by the recall of the main theme by the woodwinds, leads to the recapitulation. The earlier material is greatly abbreviated in this closing section, with just a single presentation of the opening melody and a brief, staccato version of the subsidiary theme.

The second movement, subtitled Intermezzo, which Dr. Otto Kinkleday described in his notes for the New York premiere as “tender and melancholy, yet not tearful,” is a set of free variations with an inserted episode. The descending, drooping principal theme derives from a melodic type used to express sadness since at least the time of Josquin des Pres in the late 15th century. The motive is played first by the orchestra alone, then in several transformations by the soloist. A sprightly, scherzo-like passage in quick triple meter intervenes before the last variation; it is in this episode that the chant melody from the first movement is recollected by the clarinet and bassoon. The slow tempo returns for the final variation of the Intermezzo theme, but the music is broken off by a flourish from the soloist and a brief blast from the brass to lead directly into the finale.

“One of the most dashing and exciting pieces of music ever composed for piano and orchestra” is how Patrick Piggott described the finale. It is music that employs virtually every sonorous possibility of the modern grand piano, making it a dazzling showpiece for the master performer. The movement is structured in three large sections. The first part has an abundance of themes that Rachmaninoff skillfully derived from those of the opening movement, creating a subtle but strong formal link across the entire concerto. The relationship is further strengthened in the finale’s second section, where both themes from the opening movement are recalled in slow tempo. The pace again quickens, and the music from the first part of the finale returns with some modifications. A brief solo cadenza leads to the coda, a dazzling final stanza with fistfuls of chords propelling the headlong rush to the dramatic closing gestures.

 —Dr. Richard E. Rodda