Juraj Žerovnik: Etide-Enigme, Five etudes for piano

The collection of etudes is based on a concept used by Edward Elgar in his Variations on an Original Theme, Op. 36, known as the Enigma Variations. Elgar dedicated the work to his friends depicted in the piece, with each variation being a musical portrait or sketch – a musical idea associated with someone in his inner circle of friends.

The Enigma Etudes, however, are not dedicated to my close friends personally, but to “musical friends”, composers I have met and encountered on my journey as a pianist. These composers wrote some of the most memorable works I have come across and have served as inspiration for these etudes.

Each etude has a subtitle, which consists of a series of abbreviations, or initials, of the composers whose works are cited in it. Quotations can be quite direct or very indirect. If a slash (/) appears, this means that the music is quoted in the style of another composer. The letter I indicates inversion.

Finally, the subtitles also include a word represented by the character 谜. This word is pronounced mí, in Chinese it means enigma, and I use it to denote the emergence of a musical theme on which the entire cycle of etudes is based. Moreover, the theme itself is part of a larger, overarching musical idea, which is part of my never-performed and rather unusual work.

Juraj-Marko Žerovnik