Four Preludes for Piano

Boris Papandopulo (1906 – 1991) is one of the most distinctive Croatian musicians of the 20th century. Papandopulo also worked as music writer, journalist, reviewer, pianist and piano accompanist; however, he achieved the peaks of his career in music as a composer. His composing oeuvre is imposing – Papandopulo composed almost 500 opuses: with great success he created instrumental (orchestral, concertante, chamber and solo), vocal and instrumental (for solo voice and choir), music-stage and film music. In all these kinds and genres he left a string of anthology-piece compositions of great artistic value. Four Preludes for Piano published here are taken from Papandopulo's autograph kept in the Croatian Music History Department of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts in Zagreb within Ladislav Šaban's legacy (foundation). Despite the fact that the preludes were composed within a period of 14 years (1934 – 1948) and that each of them mirrors the characteristics of the composer's musical expression and the level or artistic maturity at the time they were created, all the preludes share a high level of piano mastery required for their performance, the composer's well-formed individual and original style, and his profound sense of sound, tonal colors, characteristics and technical abilities of the piano. In that context, it would be difficult to speak of a noticeable development or differences between the preludes in the sense of artistic quality or the composer's advancements in the métier, bringing us to the conclusion that Papandopulo had already completely mastered the principles of music material formation (on the micro level) and of macro form as well as composing and virtuoso pianist techniques when he composed the first of the four preludes. After everything that has been said, the four preludes should be considered separately as independent pieces with no real links between them, and the fact that the composer finally included them all in one opus should be considered a practical decision at the given moment, and not as parts of a predetermined whole in which the individual parts have an organic logical connection, and even less as a predetermined and developed plan. (Davor Merkaš)