Impromptu in C minor, D. 899 No. 1

The piece

Schubert composed his four Impromptus D. 899 in 1827. The name comes from the Viennese publisher Tobias Haslinger, who printed the first two in December of that year. This one opens on a bare G in octaves, fortissimo; then the theme, a march in dotted rhythms, is sung alone before chords answer it. It keeps returning, changed each time, notably in A-flat major over triplets, before a calm ending in C major.

The dotted rhythm (a dotted eighth and a sixteenth) runs through almost the whole piece; keep it crisp but supple, never dry. In the triplet passages, one hand plays the dotted rhythm while the other spells out three eighths: the sixteenth falls just after the third note of the triplet, not with it. The tempo is moderate, 88 to the quarter here, and the piece lasts over nine minutes, so pace yourself, and let the dynamics, often soft, carry the tension.