The Franco-Swiss composer Frank Martin was born in Geneva in 1890 and died in the Dutch town of Naarden in 1975, where, except for a few interruptions, he lived since 1946.
Martin studied music with Joseph Lauber in Zurich and was strongly influenced by Jaques-Dalcroze, at whose Music Institute he taught. Martin also conducted a class in composition at the Musikhochschule in Cologne from 1950 to 1957. Along with Arthur Honegger and Othmar Schoeck, Frank Martin belongs to the group of composers born towards 1890 who contributed to establish Switzerland’s reputation as the birthplace of internationally esteemed composers.

Martin wrote numerous symphonic and dramatic works as well as chamber music. In particular, his oratorio Le vin herbé and the Petite symphonie concertante have found wide regard. The Etude rythmique for piano was composed in 1965 but was first published in 1973 in ehe second volume of “Contemporary Swiss Piano Music”, edited by Charles Dobler (Edition Gerig, now Edition Breitkopf).

This etude is based essentially on the contrast between ehe triplets in the right hand and the duplets in the left hand, which is pursued consistently up to the last measure. The tempo indication “tres modere” should not lead one eo underestimate ehe technical difficulty of ehe piece however, since the tempo must maintain a metronome-like regularity from beginning to end.

Wiesbaden, Summer 1980