Touches (Bernstein)


Touches: Chorale, Eight Variations and Coda, often shortened as Touches, is a composition by American composer Leonard Bernstein. Composed in 1980, it is one of Bernstein's last compositions for solo piano.

Background

Touches was a commission for the sixth Van Cliburn International Piano Competition, which all the contestants were required to perform, and dedicated "to first love, the keyboard". The title refers to touches, which is French for "piano keys", and the feeling of the pianist's fingers, hands, and arms while playing. It was composed in Fairfield, Connecticut in July, 1980, and premiered on May 24, 1981, at the piano competition in Fort Worth, Texas. It was subsequently published that same year by the Leonard Bernstein Music Publishing Company and Boosey & Hawkes.

Structure

This 10-minute composition scored for solo piano is divided into ten short movements: a chorale, where the main theme is presented; a set of eight variations on the main theme; and a final coda. All movements are meant to be played continuously with no breaks between movements. The list of movements is as follows:
A piece with relatively lower technical demands for professional pianists, Touches emphasizes expressiveness and jazzy-bluesy piano performance. Its general tone is dissonant and austere, but with strong character delineation in each variation. According to the composer, it was greatly inspired by Aaron Copland's Piano Variations, which he became enamored with as a teen, as both compositions share references to jazz and blues and have variation sets that flow easily from one section to the next. The main theme presented in the "Chorale" is similar to a piece Bernstein wrote for his daughter Jamie's 26th birthday, which was entitled Virgo Blues. It is generally conceived by critics and scholars as a fine example of Bernstein's mature style. It is often described as "austere", "solitary", and "bleak".
The general structure is somewhat circular, as the theme that is presented at the beginning in the "Chorale" is repeated in the "Coda" at the end, and Variations 1 and 8 are not only almost identical, but also variations in the strict sense of the word, insomuch as they restate the theme with certain strange and uncommon turns. The rest of the variations differ greatly from the theme in a fashion similar to the composer's own The Age of Anxiety, each variation evolving from the preceding one and diverging further and further from the main theme.

Recordings