NO JOKE

Chopin would have been incensed to learn that the English publisher Wessel, unbeknownst to him, had titled his Scherzo in B Minor, Op. 20 Le Banquet Infernal. It was a fantastic vision of death which must have greatly appealed to the British musical audiences of the 1830s. in fact the London firm had begun to assign suggestive titles to Chopin's works since the time an agreement with the composer was signed in 1831. For instance, the Bolero, Op. 19 became Souvenir d'Andalousie; the Ballade, Op. 23 La Favorite; and the early Rondo in C Minor, Op.1, upon its official publication in England in 1836, Adieu à Varsovie. But Wessel's titles horrified Chopin, as we learn from a quick note he sent to Julian Fontana from Nohant, in 1841:

Wessel is a rogue; I will never send him anything more after the Agréments au Salon. Perhaps you don't know that he has given that title to my second Impromptu, or one of the Waltzes.

Today we might find the name Le Banquet Infernal ludicrous, yet the images it conjures up are at the root of a long-lived dilemma. Indeed, a striking dichotomy between content and referent was immediately perceived, starting with Schumann: "How is gravity to clothe itself if humor goes about in such dark veils?" he asked in 1835 upon reviewing the piece. Did Wessel, along with a clever if inelegant marketing strategy, simply try to rationalize the incongruence? The meaning of the word scherzo – joke – may come as a surprise to those who wonder why Chopin's four scherzi bear this name. Frederick Niecks, the composer's first biographer, dismissed the title "Scherzo" for Op. 20 as a misnomer, and concluded that there were better things to do than carping at a name. But the conundrum still perplexes us nearly two centuries later: how can a joke be so tragic, cruel, violent, barbaric? Why did Chopin resort to the term "scherzo" to define a genre if the content does not allude in any way to the light-hearted, airy and mercurial unpredictability of a joke, the way it does in its earlier Beethovenian and Schubertian incarnations?

In a recent conversation with a colleague, I debated that the meaning of the title "Scherzo" in Chopin may have been rather distant from the necessity to depict a specific emotional state. She did not quite agree: "the notion of joke is conveyed by the frequent, surprising changes of mood. That is the joke!" she commented. I sensed that it may have been too convoluted an explanation to have been Chopin's rationale: perhaps the pianist's description could have properly applied to the idiosyncratic opening section of the Scherzo in B-flat Minor, Op. 31, or to the sudden changes of mood in the Scherzo in C-sharp Minor, Op. 39; yet the paradigm she had illustrated was inconsistent in a work such as the Scherzo in E Major, Op. 54, which parts so radically from that notion that it should have been titled something else. Further, in the Scherzo in B Minor, Op. 20 striking contrasts would be detected mostly between the outer sections and the Trio. But the same holds true for other works that are not called "scherzo", such as the Etude Op. 25, no. 10, written approximately in the same period as the Scherzo, Op. 20 and utilizing the same key signature.

The scherzo was introduced by Beethoven as a brief moment of solace between two substantial movements of a Sonata, also providing an alternative to the old-fashioned Minuet. Its appearance occurred at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and its role as a replacement for the Minuet did not emerge immediately. Indeed, Beethoven initially wavered: in the Sonata in E-flat Major, Op. 31, no. 3, of 1802, a scherzo appears next to a minuet – the latter being interestingly disguised as a slow movement. At first composers viewed the replacement of the minuet with circumspection, and it was only in the 1830s that the slow stately dance permanently vanished. Vestiges of the older form are found in Chopin's early Sonata in C Minor (1827), published posthumously as Op. 4, and in the monumental sonata in the same key that Schubert wrote in 1828, only months before his death. Schubert did write two scherzi (in B-flat Major and D-flat Major, both allegedly from 1817), published posthumously and considered today as stand-alone works on the rare occasions in which they are performed. Despite the possible autonomous function of these two brief pieces, their proportions do not exceed the ones of the scherzi found in some of his late works, such as in the Sonatas in A Major, D959, or in B-flat Major, D960.

With some exceptions, a scherzo by Schubert lasts roughly between three and four minutes. Beethoven's scherzi are equally contained. Chopin almost tripled their length, expanding it to ten or eleven minutes. In the early 1830s, Chopin became more concerned with structure: in the Ballade in G Minor, Op. 23, written concomitantly with the Scherzo, Op. 20, he had begun to deconstruct the Sonata form by introducing an abridged recapitulation that bypassed the return of the first thematic block. ABA was still favored in small-scale works (although some deviations still occurred), but when Chopin tackled larger forms, he tended to treat their structures in a highly imaginative way. While in the Scherzo in B Minor the predictable dichotomy of the ABA structure is followed literally, what surprises us is the content – a savage chase with dissonances so harsh they probably raised a few eyebrows.

Did Chopin write the Scherzo in B Minor before assigning a title to it? While he probably felt compelled to follow a scheme that included the formal ABA plus coda, which was a rather common procedure in works such as the nocturnes, he must have realized that a genre featuring a fast speed for the outer sections in contrast with a slower and more melodic middle section had yet to be categorized. The scherzi from Beethoven's sonatas or symphonies were possible precedents, though inconsistently so because a slower middle section was not necessarily prescribed. Their proportions were limited because of their function in the context of large multi-movement works. Despite the incongruence between content and referent, Chopin was drawn to the scherzo as a genre because at that time it was the only form available that allowed a clear ABA structure to be maintained. Had Chopin favored programmatic ideas in lieu of traditional genres for his titles, I suspect that this puzzling quandary would have never been raised – though Frederick Niecks would still think I do not have anything better to do than carping at a name.

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The Scherzo was introduced by Beethoven as a moment of solace between two longer and usually more intense movements of a Sonata, but also as an alternative to the old-fashioned Minuet. Its appearance occurred at the beginning of the 19th century, but its role as a replacement for the Minuet did not emerge forcefully. Beethoven initially wavered: in the Sonata in E-flat major, Op. 31, no. 3 of 1802, for example, a Scherzo appears next to a Minuet, the latter being interestingly disguised as a slow movement. In the beginning, composers accepted the replacement of the Minuet with circumspection, and it was only in the 1830s that the slow stately dance permanently vanished. Vestiges of the older form are found in Chopin'’s early Sonata in c minor (1827) and in the monumental Sonata in the same key that Schubert wrote only months before his death in 1828. Schubert did write two Scherzi (in B-flat Major and D-flat Major, supposedly from 1817), published posthumously and considered today as stand-alone works on the rare occasions in which they are performed. Despite the more autonomous function of these two brief pieces, their proportions do not exceed the ones of the Scherzi found in some of his late works, such as in the Sonatas in A Major, D959, or in B-flat Major, D960.

A scherzo by Schubert generally lasts roughly three to four minutes. Chopin tripled its length by expanding it to ten or eleven. In the early 1830s, we notice that Chopin was concerning himself with structure: in the Ballade in g minor, Op. 23, written concomitantly with the Scherzo in b minor, Op. 20, he had started deconstructing the Sonata form, introducing an abridged recapitulation that bypassed the full return of the exposition. ABA was still favored in small-scale works (although some deviations still occurred), but when Chopin tackled larger forms, he tended to treat their structures in a highly imaginative way. While in the Scherzo in b minor the predictable dichotomy of the ABA structure is followed literally, what surprises us is the content – a savage chase with dissonances so harsh that it would not be surprising to learn that quite a few eyebrows were raised, and caused one or two shrugs to boot.

Did Chopin write this Scherzo before assigning a title to it? While he probably felt compelled to follow a generic formal scheme ABA plus coda, which was quite a common procedure in works such as the nocturnes, he must have realized that no genre at that time featured a fast speed for the outer sections in contrast with a slower and more melodic middle section. The Scherzi from Beethoven's Sonatas or Symphonies were the only precedents, but their proportions were limited because of their purpose in the context of larger works. Despite the incongruence between title and content, Chopin was drawn to Scherzo as a genre because it was the only form available that allowed a clear ABA structure to be maintained. Had Chopin favored programmatic ideas in lieu of traditional genres for his titles, this puzzling quandary would have never been raised. I also suspect that Frederick Niecks would think that I do not have anything better to do than carping at a name.