Three Tempestuous Scenes
for Piano
Stefan Kisielewski was an exquisite pianist (graduated under Jerzy Lefeld), he never parted from the piano. He composed many pieces for his beloved black box and they show not only his profound knowledge about the music of the 19th century, but also Debussy, Bartok and Prokofiev, and his ability to create his own pianistic style spreading from barbaro to cantabile. Towards the end of his life, when asked by his son-in-law Adam Sławiński whether the Three Stormy Scenes for piano created in 1983 in any way correspond to the difficult reality of that time he dodged the question and said: As one pleases. It is difficult to ignore that answer, given that the final scene is a funeral march (Marciale maestoso) with distant allusions to Chopins B- flat minor Sonata. The texture of all three miniatures (perhaps with the exception of fragments of the second scene - Presto) is exceptionally dense and saturated, both in chord sequences and in the places where chords are replaced with figurations, ostinatos, quick oscillations, where colourful stains appear. Sometimes barbarism gives way to greater clarity, revealing the composers fascination with the harmonic ideas of Debussy (the middle fragments of the first scene: Maestoso-Allegro energico - Maestoso). However, a tone of seriousness and somewhat unusual tension dominates. Stefan Kisielewskis evasive answer to the question about the relationship between the composition and the reality of the time is food for thought. Is the drama of Three Stormy Scenes just the result of a search in the field of harmony, pianistic texture, a desire to show that buffo in not the only style suited to the author of Rustic Caprice? Do the Scenes convey the mood of the moment, are they an expression connected to experience of a difficult time, the 1980s? These are only a few of those many riddles left to us by Stefan Kisielewski as a composer.
- Series: Per Strumenti
- Language of edition: eng, pol
- Number of pages: 20
- Cover: softcover
- Size: A4 vertical (210x297 mm)
