Chopin’s Nocturnes: Piers Lane’s voyage of musical discovery

Pianist Piers Lane: his playing held the audience entranced

Photo credit: Benjamin Ealovega

 When London-based Australian pianist Piers Lane took the stage in Wellington a few days ago, for the first concert of his 13-centre “Nocturnes” tour, he brought with him decades of experience and understanding of Chopin’s lovely piano music. In his thoughtful hands, the complete set of Chopin’s 21 Nocturnes became a voyage for his rapt audience, a series of discoveries about how the music of this most romantic of composers developed from youthful early works to the expressive complexities of the marvellous late Nocturnes.

From a less sensitive musician, such a programme might have seemed like eating all the luxury chocolates in the box at a single sitting. With short, engaging spoken introductions at key points in the programme, Lane drew the audience into his own love of this music. But most of all, it was his playing that held a sold-out audience in the Public Trust Hall entranced for well over two hours.

The glowing beauties of Frédéric Chopin’s piano music belie not only his poor health but the social and political unrest in Europe during his composing life. Born in Poland, he left there in late 1830, arriving in Paris almost a year later with a visa stating he was “in transit to London via Paris.” He became a French citizen and never returned to Poland, though he always felt Polish, and his marvellous Polonaises and Mazurkas express his ties to his homeland. He wrote the Nocturnes throughout his short composing career, the earliest in his late teens and the last just a few years before his death, aged 39, probably from the tuberculosis that plagued much of his life.

Chopin was also an acclaimed pianist and teacher of piano, and evident in every Nocturne is his understanding of piano sonority, and of the ability of the instrument to sing a melodious line.

Composer Frédéric Chopin (1810-1849)

“…wrote his 21 Nocturnes throughout his short composing career.”

Lane’s programme begins with three early works, all published posthumously, and each has a flowing simplicity, the right hand entrusted with the melody, the left the accompaniment. In the third of these, known as Lento con gran espressione, written for the composer’s sister, we see that, even as a young man, Chopin found great musicality in a simple texture, little whimsical figures bringing variety to the piece.  

Throughout the recital, Lane’s approach is unfussy, without any over-indulgence in the music’s romantic expressiveness. He spins lovely, long melodic lines, his ornamentation exquisitely integrated with the melodic shape, running passages rippling effortlessly, tone singing, balance between melody and accompaniment always maintained. At no point during the recital are we aware of the technical challenges of the works, although the many pianists and piano teachers in the audience know that this music is not as easy as this brilliant performance suggests.  

As Lane points out, Chopin was not the first to write “Nocturnes”. The earliest were vocal entertainments performed at night. But it was Irish pianist and composer John Field, born less than 30 years before Chopin, who first created short piano pieces called “Nocturnes”, cantabile melodies over arpeggiated left hand accompaniments. Franz Liszt wrote in an introduction to his edition of Field’s Nocturnes: “None have quite attained…these half-formed sighs floating through the air, softly lamenting and dissolved in delicious melancholy.”

Chopin’s Nocturnes, though eventually much more sophisticated than Field’s, followed directly from the Irish composer’s model. In the three Nocturnes of Opus 15, written in the early 1830’s, Chopin’s bigger romantic conception was developing. In the famous Opus 15 No 2 in F# major, Larghetto, Lane finds all the grandeur required in the full, dramatic harmonies of the middle section, before returning to the lovely opening melody. And in the G minor Opus 15 No 3 that follows, the contrast of an airy spareness gives way to agitation and then an almost hymn-like simplicity, Lane’s radiant piano tone again enhancing the melodic lines. His playing also contains a lovely flexibility, a use of rubato that is never over-indulgent, restrained by elegant musicianship.

The set for the concert was a little less restrained, with bright colourful swirling shapes projected behind the pianist and pastel faux candles around him. Lane himself wore an eye-catching turquoise jacket which, while not quite channeling Liberace’s glitter, seemed a little over-the-top against the golden/orange backdrop. Was Chopin’s music enhanced by this visual drama?

The overly dry Public Trust Hall acoustics work better for piano than strings or voices but the resident Bösendorfer piano may need some expert work. The slight tinniness in the upper registers was fortunately less evident as Chopin’s musical textures became more complex as the concert proceeded.

Pianist Piers Lane

“…drew the sold-out audience in Wellington into his own love of the music.”

Photo: CMNZ

In the second half of Lane’s programme, four pairs of Nocturnes from Op. 37, 48, 55 and 62 reveal the development of Chopin’s mature harmony and magnificent pianism. The artless melodic beauties are still present, but Lane also unveils the complexity of the composer’s harmonic and textural approach. He makes sense of the different contrapuntal lines in the Bach-influenced Opus 55 No 2 in Eb major, for instance, with a virtuosic range of piano colour and dynamics. Melodies, too, are more complex, with extended trills and melismatic decorations, played with ease and a remarkable gentleness.

Lane describes the final two Nocturnes of Opus 62 as “Beethovian” in their splendour. Certainly, as we experience the breadth and maturity of the writing and the strong emotions in the music, we are aware of the distance we and the composer had travelled from the earliest Nocturnes. Finally, the ending of Opus 62 No 2 in E major is moving in its tranquil simplicity, and Lane and the audience sit quietly before an outburst of appreciative applause.

“There are no more Nocturnes,” he says, almost ruefully, offering as encore a charming Chopin Valse in C# minor.  

Piers Lane’s Nocturnes programme is currently touring New Zealand for Chamber Music New Zealand, with concerts still to come in Gisborne, Hamilton, Tauranga, Auckland, New Plymouth, Dunedin, Nelson, Invercargill, Christchurch and Queenstown. A special recital, not to be missed!  

Chamber Music New Zealand Nocturnes Piers Lane (piano) Wellington February 28, 2025. (More information and booking link for the rest of the tour here.)