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Liszts Trube Wolken can be organized into three main parts. Part I is
comprised of measures 1 through 20. Part II is comprised of measures 25
through 48 (the end). Measures 21 through 24 serve as a bridge between
the two parts.
Part I can be further divided into two parts, the first of the two being
measures 1 through 8. In these first 8 measures, Lizst introduces his short,
yet poignant six-note theme. After the theme has played twice, Lizst
provides a tremolando in the bassa kind of accompanimentabove which
the main theme plays twice more. The second of these two smaller parts
begins at measure 9 with the strike of an augmented chord (though it is
spelled in fourths) on the downbeat. After a total of six chords, the bridge
begins at measure 21.
The bridge consists of a five-note melody played in octaves. The
melody is derived from the theme. The bridge melody is then repeated. The
simple bridge is melodically open ended and serves to foster in the listener
anticipation for the second half of the piece.
Part II can be divided into two smaller parts as well. The first of these
begins at measure 25. The original six-note g minor theme plays in the bass
as before, but this time Liszt includes above it a new counterpoint motive
and turns the theme, itself, into an accompaniment. For eight bars, the
piece carries on in this two voice texture rendering a total of four repetitions
of the theme. At measure 33, the second half of part II begins. Arpeggiated
augmented chords comprise a left-hand accompaniment to an ascending
ostinato figure played in octaves by the right hand. This ostinato then
repeats twice. After the second repetition of the ostinato, there is an entire
measure of rest followed by a three bar coda, which begins at measure 46.
The structure of the piece is noticeably and deliberately parallel. In
summary, there are two distinct parts each comprised of 20 measures of
material separated by four bars of bridge. Each part then contains 8
measures of material in its first portion contrasted by twelve measures of
material in its latter portion. The four measures of bridge, which are at the
very center of the piece, are perfectly divisible into two bars of material
simply played twice. Symmetry is quite literally at the center of Trube
Wolken!
By the incorporation of a concrete, precisely organized form, Liszt may
have intended to present a contrast to the pieces more nebulous and
uncertain mood and implied poetic instability. While the mathematical
divisions of the form are easy to see when mapped out on the short twopage paper score, the minute elements of the form are not quite so apparent
to the listener when he or she hears the piece played Andante. But there is
nonetheless a comforting predictability to the piece lent by the precise
organization Liszt employs which makes the dissonances and harmonic
obscuritysoon to be addressedeasier to accept.
Section 4: Summary
Despite a palpable emotional depth and intensity, this piece is short
and contains few notes, relatively speaking. It illustrates how a good
composer can write economically and still be provocative.
I acquired some familiarity with a body of Liszts work that I didnt
beforehand know existed.
According to Grove Music Online, Liszt
experienced depression and ailing health late in his life, giving rise to this
body of music filled with lament and grief. This illustrates the importance
and helpfulness of knowing a composers biography and what was going on
in his life when interpreting a piece of his. (The same can be said of any
artist and his artwork.)
The tonal qualities of Trube Wolken are perhaps not immediately
apparent, but the elements of tonality need not be immediately apparent in
a tonal piece. Upon closer examination, scale degree and function play a
large role in Trube Wolken, as in the way the #4 moves expectedly up to
scale degree 5 in the theme or in the way the F# resolves up to the G to
confirm g minor in the stacked chords at the very end of the piece.
Nuages gris (pronounced: [na i]; French, lit. Grey Clouds), S.199 or Trbe Wolken, is a work
for piano solo composed byFranz Liszt on August 24, 1881. It is one of Liszt's most haunting and at
the same time one of his most experimental works, representing, according to Allen Forte, "a high
point in the experimental idiom with respect to expressive compositional procedure."' [1] If we must
look for biographical parallels with the music, perhaps the bleakness of mood is connected with
difficulties faced by Liszt at the time of composition, when he was suffering from dropsy, failing
eyesight, and severe injuries sustained in a fall down the stairs of the Hofgrtnerei seven weeks
earlier.[2]
Departing from his earlier virtuoso style, Liszt in his later years made several radical, compositional
experiments, includingNuages gris, Unstern S.208 and Bagatelle sans tonalit S.216. Yet it was only
in the second half of the twentieth century that the significance of Liszt's late experimental works
began to be appreciated. R. Larry Todd, for example, has noted that "Arguably, Liszt was the first
composer to establish the augmented triad as a truly independent sonority, to consider its
implications for modem dissonance treatment, and to ponder its meaning for the future course of
tonality. Liszt's accomplishments in these areas were considerable and support in no small way his
position, in Busoni's phrase, as the 'master of freedom.' [3] Scholars such as Humphrey Searle, Zoltn
Harsnyi, Bence Szabolcsi, Lajos Brdos, and Istvn Szelnyi have contributed much to placing
these works in the repertoire of today's pianists.[4]
Nuages gris is quite short and technically simple. According to Jim Samson, "the most distinctive
features of Liszt's late style are present in this short workthe avoidance of a conventional cadential
structure, the importance of semitonal movement, the use of the augmented triad as the central
harmonic unit and of parallelism as a principal means of progression." [5] The harmonies are based on
augmented triads while the melody line makes extensive reference to the hungarian minor scale.
The harmonies, which are very different from those found in his earlier works, give a very dark and
almost morbid feel to the piece. Leonard Ratner has commented: "The restless, unresolved
dissonances ofNuages gris the isolated figures, the sense of alienationthese have a clear affinity
with the somewhat later expressionism of the Viennese composers Mahler and Schoenberg....
[Nuages gris] is a musical bellwether that indicated what was happening and what would happen in
European music: sound, with the assistance of symmetry, would take over, harmony would be
absorbed into color and lose its cadential function."[6]
Claude Debussy probably had Nuages gris in mind when he composed his own Nuages.[7] Mauricio
Kagel used Nuages gris in his Unguis incarnatus est (1972).[8] in 1986, Heinz Holliger worked the
piece out into Zwei Liszt-Transkriptionen for orchestra (together with Unstern!).[9] A shocking scene at
the morgue in Stanley Kubrick's last film Eyes Wide Shut is accompanied by Nuages gris.
References[edit]
1.
Arnold, Ben, ed., The Liszt Companion, Greenwood Publishing Group, 2002, p. 169.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Decarsin, Franois. 1985. "Liszts Nuages gris and Kagels Unguis incarnatus est: A Model
and Its Issue", translated by Jonathan Dunsby. Music Analysis 4, no. 3:25963.
9.
Stefan Drees, Transkription versus bermalung. Zu Heinz Holligers und Peter Ruzickas
kreativer Auseinandersetzung mit den spten Klavierstcken Franz Liszts. In: Neue Zeitschrift fr
Musik, Schott, Mainz 04/2014, p. 44.