Bortkiewicz: Pensée lyrique Op. 11 No. 3

About the piece.

The six Pensées lyriques Op. 11 were published by D. Rahter in Leipzig in 1909, during Bortkiewicz’s Berlin years. He dedicated the set to Emmy Destinn, the Czech soprano who sang at the Berlin Court Opera at the time. They were friends, and he toured the larger German cities with her.

None of the six pieces has a title. Each is known only by its key and tempo marking. No. 3 is in E major and marked Allegretto grazioso. It is the shortest of the set: recordings run from under a minute to about a minute and a half.

The set is still in print as a Rahter title, but only two complete recordings are easy to find: Jouni Somero’s on FC-Records, the performance this tutorial is made from, and Klaas Trapman’s in his complete Bortkiewicz piano music on Piano Classics. A reviewer of Somero’s recording hears early Scriabin in it.

Learn it at your own speed.

This tutorial was made with LumaKeys, a Mac app for learning piano from falling notes. Open a MIDI file of the piece, or transcribe a piano recording you have, then slow it down, loop the hard bars and practise one hand at a time. The download is free.