Phone
Tablet - Portrait
Tablet - Landscape
Desktop
Toggle navigation
Performers
Steinway Performers
Albright, Charlie
Anderson, Greg
Arishima, Miyako
Benoit, David
Biegel, Jeffrey
Birnbaum, Adam
Braid, David
Brown, Deondra
Brown, Desirae
Brown, Gregory
Brown, Melody
Brown, Ryan
Caine, Uri
Chen, Sean
Chulochnikova, Tatiana
Deveau, David
Farkas, Gabor
Feinberg, Alan
Fung, David
Gagne, Chantale
Golan, Jeanne
Goodyear, Stewart
Graybil, Matthew
Gryaznov, Vyacheslav
Gugnin, Andrey
Han, Anna
Han, Yoonie
Iturrioz, Antonio
Khristenko, Stanislav
Kim, Daniel
Li, Zhenni
Lin, Jenny
Lo Bianco, Moira
Lu, Shen
Mahan, Katie
Mao, Weihui
Melemed, Mackenzie
Min, Klara
Mndoyants, Nikita
Moutouzkine, Alexandre
Mulligan, Simon
Myer, Spencer
O'Conor, John
O'Riley, Christopher
Osterkamp, Leann
Paremski, Natasha
Perez, Vanessa
Petersen, Drew
Polk, Joanne
Pompa-Baldi, Antonio
Rangell, Andrew
Roe, Elizabeth Joy
Rose, Earl
Russo, Sandro
Schepkin, Sergei
Scherbakov, Konstantin
Shin, ChangYong
Tak, Young-Ah
Ziegler, Pablo
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
Back 1 step
Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Prokofiev
Concerto for Piano no 3 in C major, Op. 26
Interpretations
About This Work
Controls
Cover
Artists
Label
Movements
×
Add To Playlist
Success
This selection has been added.
Playlist
Create
Cancel
Confirm
Cancel
About This Work
For his third concerto for piano and orchestra, Prokofiev looked to the past for inspiration: this concerto incorporates material derived from sketches made between 1911 and 1918. The first movement contains two themes that were written in 1916, plus a chordal passage first sketched in 1911; the second movement contains a theme and variations that was written in 1913, while the final movement uses thematic material from a discarded string quartet begun in 1918. When he began composing this concerto during a holiday in Brittany, Prokofiev wrote, "I already had all the thematic material I needed except for the third theme of the finale and the subordinate theme of the first movement." The Third Piano Concerto is perhaps Prokofiev's best known essay in this genre, and approaches Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov in popularity and frequency of performance. Its opus number places it just after the "Classical" First Symphony of 1917, and the concerto is, in its way, similar to the First Symphony is a number of ways: both works are lively, acerbic, with brilliant orchestration and a certain transparent texture. Both pieces are also clearly the work of a deft young composer of considerable technical skill; however, the two works differ greatly in regards to their reception. The "Classical" Symphony was reasonably well received in Russia, where it was performed only once before Prokofiev emigrated to the United States. Subsequent performances of the symphony in America were very successful. The Third Concerto, on the other hand, did not fare so well, and after a good premiere in Chicago (along with the opera Love for Three Oranges) in 1921, the work was roundly denounced in New York.
The concerto displays much of the "harmonic liveliness," in Nancy Siff's words, of the mid-period symphonies, with its sudden shifts from key to key and chromatic harmony. The sophistication and bravura generally associated with Prokofiev's music is ever present, as is the humor found in many of his orchestral works. The concerto is in a traditional three-movement concerto form (the only one of Prokofiev's five piano concertos to use the traditional form), beginning and ending with fast movements that flank a slow middle movement. Each movement is about the same length, and the thematic weight and interest is distributed evenly throughout the movements. The work begins with a vivacious opening movement, which includes a humorous march underlined by castanets, followed by the five variations of the second movement, and concludes with a grandiose display of colorful harmonies and virtuosic orchestration. The solo writing for the piano is also virtuosic, and at times quite percussive.
-- Alexander Carpenter
×
Add To Playlist
Success
This selection has been added.
Playlist
Create
Cancel
Confirm
Cancel
1F1D406F573D10139EF395E51251F086