Sigismond Thalberg's Twelve Etudes, Op. 26 and Fantasia on Beethoven's 7th Symphony, Op. 39: The aesthetics of performance
Chien, Meng-Chun
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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/103434
Description
Title
Sigismond Thalberg's Twelve Etudes, Op. 26 and Fantasia on Beethoven's 7th Symphony, Op. 39: The aesthetics of performance
Author(s)
Chien, Meng-Chun
Issue Date
2019
Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)
Kinderman, William
Doctoral Committee Chair(s)
Ehlen, Timothy
Committee Member(s)
Herrera, Ricardo
Parisi, Susan
Department of Study
School of Music
Discipline
Music
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
A.Mus.D. (doctoral)
Keyword(s)
Sigismond Thalberg
Piano Etudes, Op. 26
Fantasia on Beethoven’s 7th Symphony, Op. 39
Romantic Piano Works
Language
en
Abstract
Sigismond
Thalberg
(1812-1871), was
a
Swiss-born virtuoso pianist,
one of the most
famous keyboard artists of the
nineteenth
century. Often compared to Franz Liszt, Thalberg gave
recitals in m
any cities in various
countries,
ending his
career in the American
midwest, in Peoria,
Illinois, in 1858. This thesis explores Thalberg’s Twelve Etudes Op. 26 and Fantasia on
Beethoven’s 7th
Symphony, a pairing of works sometimes made in his own concert programs. A
focus on these works allows for investigation of the aesthetics of performance in Thalberg’s
music.
Chapter 1
outlines
the background and motivation for the project,
consider
current state of
research on Thalberg’s music, and offers a biographical sketch of Sigismond Thalberg’s life and
career.
In
Chapter 2, the challenges
of
technique in the Twelve
Etudes,
Op. 26
are addressed with
reference to
Thalberg’s
L’art
du
chant
appliqué
au
piano,
Op. 70.
Chapter
3
offers
detailed
discussion
of Thalberg’s Fantasia
on
Beethoven’s
7th
Symphony,
“Souvenir de Beethoven,”
Op.
39,
focusing
on
Thalberg’s development
of
themes
from
both
Beethoven’s 5th
and 7th
symphonies.
The analyses of both
Op. 26
and
Op. 39 will also
evaluate
Thalberg’s
trademark
“three-hand”
technique, and its applications for the modern performer.
I hope to
encourage pianists to
perform more of the musically rich repertoire embodied
operatic
transcriptions and paraphrases by nineteenth-century
composers, including the
transcriptions from French, Italian, and
Wagnerian
operas by
Liszt, and particularly, the operatic
paraphrases by Sigismond Thalberg, and also the
unique
paraphrase of Beethoven’s symphonies
embodied in his Fantasia Op. 39. The Beethoven Fantasy is rich in dramatic
conflict, ending with
a
plunge
from the
Berg
into the
Thal, from the triumphant peak into the shadowed valley of
Beethoven’s processional march.
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