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At The Upright Piano
As uprights go, the salon's piano
is rather marvelous---to say the least.
Although, according to appearances,
it may seem rather plain, old fashioned, and
an antique worth only some sentiment
(so skeptics and appraisers might agree),
it is, again I say, a marvel of
music that is not heard the same, elsewhere.
At night, somehow, it summons to itself
an orchestra of all the instruments
required for a complete performance of
the second movement of Chopin's Second
Piano Concerto in F minor.
Certain conditions accompany this:
nights---cloudless, sparkling with a multitude
of stars, and always after midnight by
at least an hour, or sometimes even more.
(One must not think of this as haunting in
the sense of old ghost stories or accounts
told by demented grandmothers to scare
frightened grandchildren who are not aware
that they can just stand up and walk way.)
At the right moment, silence has become
almost an audible reality
rather than just the mere absence of sound.
Excluding every other noice, the strings
begin their trembling; then the woodwinds join,
and then the whole ensemble welcomes the
paino's melody, and its main theme.
Some have said that this single movement is
the most perfect music ever composed---
its orchestration, harmony and tone
of such profound emotions have surpassed
the sum of all other composers' works.
I do not have the right credentials to
assert such judgments, nor am qualified
to make comparisons. I only know
the music is ethereal enough,
especially when it has been performed
by a piano at which no one sits
and a whole orchestra not seen at all.
He wrote it for the first love of his life,
Constantia. Did she nurse him during his
seemingly endless illnesses? Did she
provide the country home with plenty of
unbroken solitude during which he
composed? No, I suppose not: she was just
his first love. After he expired, they sliced
his heart out. I still wonder what they might
have found in it, and how much had remained
of its quite discontented contents? That
should be a question poets must address.
Nohant is a museum now. People
come through here daily, gawking at its past.
But after closing, and the staff has gone,
perhaps this coming night, the beautiful
Larghetto will perform itself again.
Despite myself, and that it was composed
for her---Constantia---I still never tire
to hear it from beneath the fragrant grass
that covers me, ever, in Nohant's soil.
Starward
[jlc]
