Description
The 2nd Piano Sonata was composed by the only 16-year-old Martin Münch in 1977 and 1978 under the fresh and strong impression of his encounter with the sound language of Alexander Scriabin. Before that, it had been exclusively Maurice Ravel who had influenced the young composer's early works with his impressionistic and seductive sound world. The young composer's second contribution to the genre, in contrast to the three-movement 1st Piano Sonata, is single-movement and bears the title "Struggle for Style". Behind this is the desire to unite and reconcile three concerns in equal measure: to achieve the tonal mastery of Ravel, to make the harmonic adventures of Scriabin available to himself and, despite all these thoroughly audible homages and references, nevertheless to single-mindedly find his own style.
In Martin Münch's oeuvre, the 2nd Piano Sonata takes on a function of radical change, for on the one hand, the works written at the same time were much more conventional in character, and on the other, it shows itself to be an advance by the young composer to open up tonal worlds that point to a new level of style for him. He developed this in the subsequent 3rd Sonata and largely maintained it until the next upheaval, which led to modal composing with the Chamber Symphony op. 20 and the Saxophone Quintet op. 21.
The pianist has the demanding task of working out the peculiarities of the respective themes in a profiled manner between impressionistic sound frenzy, harmonic intricacies and delicate alienations (for example of a waltz) and nevertheless ensuring a coherent overall impression.