An exciting and subtle performance from Glemser. For Schumann, the sonata was more of an exploratory narrative rather than an architecture — his form is always organic, idiosyncratic. The third sonata is particularly hard to interpret as a coherent whole, as it is bursting at the seams with incredible ideas stacked one on top of the other in rapid succession: in the 1st + 4th movements lyrical melodies are pulled taut across madcap scales and arpeggios; the rhythms are obsessively dotted, in typical fashion; there’s lots of hair-raising gear-shifting and scampering pianissimo passages that turn to mush if you seeks safety in the sustaining pedal. Glemser’s performance is a triumph precisely because it manages to bring unity and clarity to such a bedazzlingly inventive work. It is a testament to the musical value of this seldom-played work that it was premiered five years after the composer’s death by Brahms, who loved it very much.
00:00 — Mvt 1, Allegro brillante: Schumann places emphasis on the intermezzo-like transitions from one theme to another, elevating them to thematic status in Beethovenesque style. The development section, which begins with a false reprise [3:30] as memorable as it is deceptive, stresses some of the apparently trivial motivic material of the exposition.
07:52 — Mvt 2, Scherzo — Notice that opening of the Scherzo anticipates the “Clara” theme of the third movement. The movement features some fascinating contrapuntal textures [see the passage beginning at 12:08].
14:00 — Mvt 3, Quasi Variazioni. A deeply moving set of variations built around the same Clara theme (the notes spell out CLARA in German) that Brahms used in his Schumann Variations (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVLGC…), and which is *already present* in the first movement’s dramatic LH opening statement. The theme as used here is strange in form — a series of four-measure units arranged AABBCC, lacking the expected restatement at the end. In the four variations the theme is never found in its original twenty-four-bar form. Sometimes it is shortened: in Variation 1, the form becomes AABAA; in Variation 3, which is cast in binary form, the A theme is followed only by B. At other times, the theme is expanded: in Variation 2, the “expected” reprise (AA) is added at the end; in Variation 4, a two-measure version of A is followed by a six-measure version of B, after which a substantial coda is appended.
22:20 — Mvt 4, Prestissimo possibile. This movement features wildly inventive textures [25:17], spikily humoresque-ish figuration, and the relentless superimposition of puzzling rhythms over the basic meter in an effort to destroy the listener’s sense of the bar line. The opening figuration is yet another veiled reference to the Clara theme, and the finale features some gloriously colourful writing.