Bartok – Third Piano Concerto
by Max Derrickson
Bartok – Third Piano Concerto
[. . .] Though much of Bartok’s music is rather modern and dissonant, the Third Piano Concerto is very different in nature. The first movement, Allegretto, opens with gently pulsing strings and a lilting first theme from the piano. The entire work is very tonal harmonically, and this opening paves the way. It evokes a rhapsodic tenderness, a quiet brimming of joy. The second section, the development, paraphrases a tune from Maurice Ravel’s G-Major Piano Concerto. The music in this movement is never dense but retains a transparent quality. The solo piano part is tempered and linear, rarely evoking bravura.
Adagio religioso, the second movement, begins like a setting sun on a summer evening. [. . .] The Allegro vivace closes the whole work in the form of a rondo in syncopated overdrive. It is very Bartokian in its spirit and rhythmical interplay, complex but utterly playful. As so many finales are intended to do, this one is a release of energy, a jubilation, a spirited dance. As the work flies toward an exuberant end, [. . .]