One of those delightful recital items that would have been known to anyone who went to piano concerts 100 years ago but that the grim reaper of Serious Classical Music nearly killed off, the Rubinstein Waltz-Caprice (or Valse-Caprice) of 1870 remains one of the better-known works of this Western-leaning Russian composer. Despite Rubinstein's overall indebtedness to Chopin, this eight-minute work does not have the flavor of Chopin's waltzes; it is a bigger, less lyrical piece that evokes Liszt to some degree. Harmonically straightforward until the action-packed finale, it consists mostly of a series of alternating waltz strains; the opening tonic-centered melody is limpid and innocent but contains a big leap to a solitary sforzando high note. That leap recurs and is amplified in later tonic strains. (This is the caprice part, one assumes.) The contrasting strains are more chromatic, with big chords and plenty for the left hand to do. At the end there's a spectacular shift to common time and some very flashy extended cadential passages that are guaranteed to please. The Waltz-Caprice is full of rumbling piano figurations that strongly suggest orchestral textures, and it is indeed known in a setting for orchestra. As the slow introduction leads into the opening theme, you can almost, when hearing the orchestral version, imagine that you're listening to a Strauss waltz—until you realize that if it really were Strauss there would be more happening rhythmically.

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