Sergei Prokofiev: Piano Sonatas I

Description

Few twentieth-century composers embody the rich complexities of their era as fully as Sergei Prokofiev. His music occupies a fascinating midpoint between unbridled emotional fervour and meticulous formal control, between diabolical virtuosity and unrestrained lyricism, and between vanguard aggression and a cherished engagement with tradition. Both as a man and as an artist, Prokofiev exhibits a distinctive ambiguity—of intent and aesthetics—that, far from weakening his musical expression, bestows upon it a uniquely universal quality. Never definitively anchored in any single place or ideology, he absorbs and reflects them all, yet fully belongs only to his own creative genius.
Prokofiev was an outstanding pianist—introduced to the instrument at a very young age by his mother, herself a pianist and teacher—and this affinity remained central to his compositional outlook. Indeed, his piano works span his entire creative arc and thus offer an invaluable vantage point from which to observe his evolution, his stylistic breadth, and his instinctive engagement with contemporary currents. To hear his first Piano Sonata, Op. 1, followed immediately by his later sonatas, Opp. 83 and 84, in a single recording is to witness both extremes of a singular creative journey. Sonatas Nos. 7 and 8 complete the so-called “War Sonatas” trilogy, and, in a broader sense, draw to a close Prokofiev’s sonata writing in an epic, dramatic vein. The subsequent Sonata No. 9, Op. 103, is a rather different undertaking, more intimate and diatonic in character.
Prokofiev’s Sonata Op. 1 was composed and revised between 1907 and 1909, during his tutelage under Anatoly Lyadov. Although the piece may still betray an impulse to please his mentor and lacks absolute compositional independence, it is already striking in its synthesis of disparate influences. Prokofiev revisited one of the numerous sonatas of his youth, choosing a particularly sound example for further refinement. In early twentieth-century Russia, the single-movement sonata enjoyed a vogue—likely inspired by Liszt—and both Scriabin and Medtner excelled in its composition. Prokofiev was intimately familiar with their work: indeed, while revising his own Op. 1, he was studying Scriabin’s Sonata No. 5, and his dedication of the piece to his childhood friend, the veterinarian Vassily Morolyov (an ardent devotee of Scriabin), reflects this influence.
In 1907, at the time of the Sonata’s initial version, Prokofiev also purchased Medtner’s Fairy Tales Op. 8 on the recommendation of Myaskovsky, studying them closely while shaping his final draft. Many harmonic and structural elements testify to this influence—not least the varied reprise of the introduction at the conclusion. Prokofiev’s engagement with the great Russian lineage of sonata form, in dialogue with both Medtner and Scriabin, is further underscored by the choice of F minor, the same key as Medtner’s and Scriabin’s First Sonatas, as well as Beethoven’s.
Fast-forward to 1943—amid the tumult of the Great Patriotic War—and we encounter the première of Prokofiev’s Sonata No. 7, Op. 83, given by Sviatoslav Richter and awarded the Stalin Prize that very year. By then, Prokofiev had returned to Russia for some time and, for reasons of safety during the conflict, was evacuated—together with other leading Soviet artists—to the Caucasus. In this relative isolation, he worked on his large-scale opera War and Peace (after Tolstoy), on the music for Ivan the Terrible, and on the three “War Sonatas” for piano: Nos. 6, 7, and 8.
Prokofiev’s compositional language reached its zenith in these works, and his piano writing epitomises its principal characteristics. Although resolutely anti-Romantic, it nonetheless abounds in expressiveness, engaging directly with the historical and political climate while resisting overtly programmatic depiction. Sonata No. 7 opens with a sinister, distant signal that rapidly gives way to a terrifying, mechanistic elaboration—suggestive, perhaps, of an advancing armoured division. The entire opening movement conjures a ghostly danse macabre, propelled by a frenzied tarantella-like rhythm and punctuated by stark unison passages that intensify the sense of desolation. Yet this manic energy yields, momentarily, to the nostalgic aura of an Andantino sharing thematic material with the main subject—hinting at the sorrow of the weak and the vanquished. The central movement, Andante caloroso, offers a brief respite from menace and anguish, its melodic lines in the piano’s middle register evoking a necessary, human diversion from the overwhelming drama of war. But this reprieve is abruptly dispelled by the Precipitato in 7/8, its relentless ostinato spiralling into an unending vortex. The ensuing virtuoso finale—among the most influential in pianistic literature—evokes a broken mechanism whose very malfunction attains a strange inevitability.
Composed in 1944 and dedicated to Prokofiev’s second wife, the poet Mira Mendelssohn, Sonata No. 8, Op. 84, brings the trilogy to an unexpectedly different conclusion. Its first movement—perhaps its most adventurous and personal—opens in a freer, rhapsodic manner, oscillating between an introspective, meditative theme and another of robust rhythmic force. The middle movement, Andante sognando, is a brief yet poignant lyrical poem, standing in marked contrast to the final Vivace, where wit meets incisive energy. Prokofiev drew extensively on material originally intended for a cinematic adaptation of The Queen of Spades that he later abandoned. Despite the work’s complex polyphony and large-scale form, its narrative contrasts bear a distinctly cinematic imprint. Indeed, one of Prokofiev’s greatest gifts—his facility for making even the most dissonant harmonic progressions sound entirely natural—is matched by his innate sense of storytelling, which guides the listener through abrupt shifts of mood with extraordinary poise.
This final “War Sonata” thus offers a more private perspective on the turmoil of its time, while exemplifying a central, if elusive, aspect of Prokofiev’s genius: his music is never truly personal or confessional. In this regard, he may be the most thoroughly anti-Romantic composer of the twentieth century, seldom revealing himself openly; yet his music touches the deepest emotional chords, brimming with passion and pathos. This paradox—his seemingly impersonal stance generating such intense engagement—remains unresolved and endlessly compelling. The more dispassionate and mechanical his writing may appear, the more it resonates with human empathy; the more intricately he manipulates form, the more spontaneously his music flows.
Herein lies Prokofiev’s mastery of modernity’s most profound contradictions: his greatness stems not in spite of his paradoxes, but because of them. Although the historical conflicts that shaped his epoch have long since subsided, his voice—born of those events and intended to reflect them—retains its compelling freshness. By seamlessly melding the Russian tradition with an innovative and forward-looking idiom, Prokofiev accomplished, in Sibelius’s words, “a new wind blowing through the traditions.” That wind, strong and ever-present, continues to carry his influence forward to this day.
Carlo Goldstein © 2025