Prelude Number 4 by Chopin

Prelude No. 4 is a Romantic period piece written by Frederic Chopin for the pianoforte. The first impression of the piece could be construed as sad; richly and unrelentingly sad, a scene in a movie where the main character dies. The most important features of the piece are its organization, keys, and tempo related to dynamics. The whole piece is a little over two minutes long and possesses approximately 120 beats per minute. The most awkward part of the piece, which starts with a single middle note, is the fact that it speeds up and slows down on the left hand. The left hand plays continuous chords until the one-minute mark of the piece. The chord pattern relies on the four/four time signature, or possibly cut time. The left hand for the first part of the piece drifts between two measures of quarter-note chords that are extremely vast and daunting. After two measures of these stagnant chords, they switch to a minor key and then back to the major key following the two subsequent measures. The interesting part of the piece is the crescendo occurs where the piece speeds up. The melody is simple one note right hand movements. Mostly dotted half notes scar the landscape of this piece. There are a few trills that rely on 32nd notes in the middle of the piece. The melody is basically two notes until forty seconds into the piece, where it finds itself reaching octaves and then fingering the middle, a slow legato. The true melody is begun with a part where the treble clef plays a melody at a cadenza at around one minute. This introduces the melody, where it is played with a few variations until 1:30 where the pieces reaches double forte. The piece then changes into a very distinguishable key change, where the melody changes concurrently. The melody is back to the sole two notes played at the beginning of the piece. The notes purpose is to harmonize and accentuate the bottom chordate. It begins to slow down and eventually stops, and at this point is very quiet, with a definite fermata held on a middle note. Then silence appeared. Silence is what makes the piece reach its climax. There is something about silence in this piece that gives it definition. The supposed climax of this piece would be where the music swells fifteen seconds prior. Two measures of silence have passed. The ending can be described in detail, for it is only three chords. The first chord is played for a whole note, followed by a similar variation of a root chord, then back to the first chord, all of which were a mezzo forte. It could be simply described as ‘A B A’ for a three measure ending. The prelude is a simple dreary tune, with few antics and oratory flare. Yet, it is relied upon as a standard dark work of the Classical time period, and a similar and dependent piece of Chopin’s No. 20. Neither can the author recommend if the listener is under the weather, and may God have mercy on this poor man’s tortured soul.