Richard Strauss: Five Piano Pieces - Funf Klavierstücke Op.3 (1881)

Richard Strauss: Five Piano Pieces - Funf Klavierstücke Op.3 (1881)
1. Andante (00:00)
2. Allegro vivace. Scherzando (04:26)
3. Largo (07:21)
4. Allegro molto (14:14)
5. Allegro marcatissimo (18:13)

The reasons for von Bullow's brusque repudiation are difficult to understand over a century later, particularly in view of the fact that his own idol had long since become a model for the young Strauss. And this admiration for Johannes Brahms, the most highly venerated master, is patently evident in the five Klaviersiiide, Opus 3. Admittedly the typically Brahmsian tone is discreetly intenwoven with the stylistic characteristics of other great romantic composers.

For instance, the obvious tripartite design, the conspicuously cantabile melodic stamp and the volatile harmonies of the first piece are unmistakably indebted to Robert Schumann, while the middle piece of the cycle, a sombre, funeral march-like and much more innovative Largo in C minor is reminiscent of Chopin. It is preceded and followed by two Mendelssohnian scherzandi, while in the finale Strauss demonstates his contrapuntal abilities by subjecting a rather wooden marcato theme to a skilfully fugal development.

It was very probably the stylistic heterogeneity and the highly derivative aspect of these miniatures that Hans von Bullow found offensive. But these carefree characteristic pieces in the spirit of the past are unquestionably skilfully crafted, albeit harmonically limited and still without any strongly individual stamp. And what von Bullow called "immature and precocious" is no more than the groping quest of a young artist for a personal idiom with the means of a retrospective, imitative stylistic synthesis.