all by...Rachmaninov

When I listended to Rachmaninov’s piano concerto no.2 (during one morning makeup routine)—2nd movement Adagio—I found it surprisingly similar to the pre-chorus of Celine Dion’s hit All by Myself. Turned out, that Rachmaninov’s most popular piece is a pop song.

Rachmaninov Op. 18 | Piano Concerto No. 2

This C Minor masterpiece is dedicated to Nikolai Dahl, the Paris-trained amateur viola player and physician who, with a series of daily therapy sessions over a period of months, helped Rachmaninoff climb out of his depression. At the root of the composer’s sense of despair was the disastrous premiere of his First Symphony in 1897—its critical reception was so bad that the composer, for three years, lost all confidence in his ability to compose. Following Dahl’s treatment, which combined hypnosis and positive-suggestion therapy, the Second Piano Concerto became the work that put Rachmaninoff’s name on the musical map—and in such virtuosic style.

—Apple Music Classical

Eric Carmen and ‘All by Myself’

According to the interview with Eric Carmen, who is the composer of Celine Dion’s 1975 hit single All by Myself—2nd place on Billboard Hot 100!. The song’s melody was conceived when the composer was listening to Rachmaninov’s 2nd piano concerto.

[Eric] When I was writing that album, I was listening to my favorite music which was Rachmaninoff. “All By Myself” incorporated a melody from his 2nd piano concerto as the verse… I wrote the music and figured out how to incorporate this little classical interlude that I’d written into the middle.

—interview with Eric Carmen

The pre-chorus background chord progression is identical to the motive in the original concerto, starting at 1:45 in this Daniil Trifonov recording. The origianl melody passes between the piano, flute, and clarinet. Eric combined them and used as the basis for the pre-chorus melody and connecting part for All by Myself.

anecdote | the copyright issue

Although Rachmaninov’s music was in the public domain in the United States, it wasn’t in some other parts of the worlds—and Eric Carmen did get into a little trouble because of it.

After the album’s release, Carmen was contacted by the Rachmaninov estate and together they agreed that, alongside a songwriter credit for Rachmaninov himself, the estate would also receive a 12 percent share of the royalties made from the song.

And so it was that the great Russian composer Sergei Rachmaninov came to add ‘chart-topping power ballad’ songwriter to his CV – and had one of his works performed by the one and only Celine Dion.

—Classic FM.

conclusion

Classical music are powerfully rich in emotion and complexity that an slight dose (when infused adequately) can support a motif for a complete pop hit—examples are non-exhaustive. Tchaikovsky’s Valse being adjusted into Once Upon a Dream in Disney’s Sleeping Beauty; Billy Joel’s The Night uses a melody from Beethoven’s Sonata Pathétique; and more recently, BlackPink used one bar of Paganini’s La Campanella as the base for their returning single Shut Down.

But, it isn’t to say that it’s copy-and-paste simple:

It’s an unusual musical feature [classical infusion] to hear in a pop song, and one that requires a skilled songwriter, such as Eric Carmen or Sergei Rachmaninov, to pull off.

reference

[1] Apple Music. (n.d.). Sergei Rachmaninoff. Retrieved July 7, 2024, from https://music.apple.com/us/artist/sergei-rachmaninoff/4341619

[2] Carmen, E. (n.d.). Eric Carmen interview. Retrieved July 7, 2024, from https://www.ericcarmen.com/eric-interview-01.html

[3] Classic FM. (n.d.). Sergei Rachmaninov: Piano Concerto No.2 & Eric Carmen’s ‘All By Myself’. Retrieved July 7, 2024, from https://www.classicfm.com/composers/rachmaninov/piano-concerto-2-all-by-myself/