Sergei Prokofiev began work on his Third Piano Concerto in St. Petersburg (Leningrad) in 1917, and, after a long interruption to concertize in America, completed it in October of 1921. He incorporated into it musical ideas he had jotted down over the past several years.
For example, the parallel triads in the recapitulation of the first movement came from 1911, when he was planning a piano concerto “full of virtuoso passages.” The main theme in E minor of the second movement comes from 1913. Other themes from the years 1916-18 were absorbed into the concerto.
The first performance took place not in the composer’s native land but in Chicago, on December 16, 1921, with the composer at the piano and Frederick Stock conducting. Neither in Chicago nor in subsequent New York performances did the concerto arouse much enthusiasm-Prokofiev said the American public “did not quite understand the work.” Nevertheless, it went on to become one of the half dozen or so most popular piano concertos of the entire twentieth century.
Today, I listened to this enjoyable work performed by Yuja Wang with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Kirill Petrenko. Here is a sample:
