Franck's 'Prelude, Chorale and Fugue' | Analysis for Performers with Johnandrew Slominski

What do you get when you cross Bach and Wagner? The answer is César Franck!
Franck was born on the very day Beethoven finished his 9th Symphony, so perhaps he was predestined to develop a close relationship with music of the past. As Johnandrew Slominski reveals, the Prelude from Franck's signature 'Prelude, Chorale and Fugue' follows an arpeggiated voice-leading pattern that could have been ripped from Bach's figuration preludes in the first book of the Well-Tempered Clavier, except that it employs late-romantic harmonies reminiscent of Wagner. Inside the moody first few bars of the Prelude lies a motive that ends up unifying the entire work: a "Kreuz," or "cross" motive that resembles Bach's musical signature.
To watch Slominski's extended analysis of Franck's complete Prelude, Chorale and Fugue, click here:
app.tonebase.c...
---
tonebase gives you instant access to knowledge from the world's greatest classical musicians, performers, and educators. Learn more by visiting tonebase.co/piano
Facebook - / tonebasepiano
Instagram - / tonebasepiano
Questions? Contact us: [e-mail]

[@charlessmith263]

Cesar Franck, later on in the Prelude, introduces us to the "trauriges Leitmotiv" from the B-A-C-H theme. This means "the sad motive" or "the plaintive motive."
Before Wagner, this falling motive was seen in earlier German composers and non-German composers in the Sturm and Drang technique in Western music during the Classical period. Listen to the opening of Haydn's 20th Piano Sonata in C minor, the first movement, to hear that falling motive in the melody in action.
This motive depicts the regular note first, then the next note going down by a half a step or a full step. If I were an expert in German, this would be called "der fallende Zweitel", or falling second. So we get the "falling second Leitmotiv", or "das Leitmotiv des fallende Zweitels" in German.
This fragment of that B-A-C-H theme would be explosively coming out in the "Fugeteil" (or Fugue part) of this magnum opus piano piece by Franck. Keenly, the fugal theme of the falling chromatic scale.

[@thays3649]

I love your commentary. It’s a work that I have been fascinated with for some years having trained as a pianist and then going back to undertake organ performance studies. Presently preparing this work along with the Bach Chromatic Fantasia & Fugue, and also the Liszt BACH as inclusions in a larger program.Thank you for your thoughts and insights. I’m also working through the connections. Imagine discussing these ideas with other musicians and composers? It’s one of the reasons why I love preparing and playing the works.

[@lluisrafalessole-classical5068]

Fantastic music 🎹👏

[@kennethng9653]

Thanks for making these videos!

[@sk8rjer]

Wow! Very interesting to say the least!

[@gerardbedecarter]

Most interesting.