Earl Wild's Piano transcription of Saint-Saens "Le Rouet d'Omphale" op. 31

This piece was the exact cascade of energy makeover I needed to day! The piece is incredibly lyrical and crystal waterish, while at the same time being like an enormous waterfall of fast, flowing water gushing off the side of a cliff back into the crystal water at the bottom with occasional musical trill glimmers of sunshine reflecting its serenity. The piece, clocking in at 8 minutes is the longest ternary form I've studied this far. It begins with an A section that has very slow arpeggios that are suddenly interrupted by abrupt, double tempo arpeggios. This play between tempo goes back and forth adding intensity. Then there is a very fast scalar passage played in the upper register with light chords on the bottom. Next there is a big shift in rhythm between very broken and dissonant chords with the very melodic, flowing passages. It's like rhythm, tempo, and tonality are teasing each other. Finally, they all get on the teetertotter together and the music is only sustained through the unity of the different sections until a huge chordal section enters making the listener think, "Wow!" The theme is played in octaves with all of the other stuff happening all around it. Finally all the chords are in complete unison and the extra ornamental "stuff" is dropped along with the loud dynamics to a soft and subtle return of the A section. This time, the A section shows off a little adding different ornamentation and interpolations and extensions. It is a very pleasing piece.