Carl Nielsen came to the piano somewhat late for a musician; while a teen in a Danish military band he filled a piggy bank with coins which he eventually exchanged for a used spinet and a copy of Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier. He rapidly made up for lost time, not only acquiring a serviceable technique but also developing a bold and original approach to creating works for that instrument. Like Sibelius his keyboard output is overshadowed by his other major works. Unlike his Finnish contemporary, however, Nielsen's corresponding body of work in that medium is consistently beyond the salon genre. Though sporadic in appearance, the same virility, imagination and daring permeate these works as in the symphonies and concertos.

The Chaconne of 1916 came after a seventeen-year hiatus in Nielsen's piano output. Composed in a period of intense concentration and revelry in the rediscovered medium, the work possesses sweep, a term often appended to the composer to define a constant motion and inevitability of process; indeed the amount of erasures in the original manuscript are minimal. Nielsen's early self-indoctrination with Bach gleams through the measures. The austere opening theme is followed by twenty variations which run a wide gamut of mood and texture. Some, like Variation 9, hearken back to the composer's initiation with the WTC and are comparatively easy to execute. Others, like the following No. 10, show highly complex contrasts between hands, compounded by animated runs of 32nd notes. Variations 16 through 17 form a climactic arch. The dynamic level never drops below triple forte and dissonance becomes the predominant language. The two penultimate ones show a winding-down, easing into the last tranquil one in D minor resolving to D major.



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