Op. 1

Dutilleux assigned the designation 'Op. 1' to his Piano Sonata (1947–48) to mark it as the first work he considered worthy of his mature standards — a deliberate act of self-criticism that resulted in the disowning of everything he had written before it, including a substantial body of vocal music, piano pieces, and Conservatoire examination works. This self-imposed boundary is unusual in its clarity and severity: a whole decade of composition, including some published and widely performed pieces, was excluded from his 'official' catalogue. The Piano Sonata thus occupies a unique position as both an Op. 1 and a work of unmistakable maturity.

Understanding the Op. 1 designation helps frame the Piano Sonata's ambition. Dutilleux was 31 years old and had been composing professionally for a decade when he wrote it. He brought everything he had absorbed — French Impressionism, the rigour of Bartók, the pianistic range of Prokofiev — and synthesised it into something that sounds like none of them. Approach it as a statement of artistic identity, not a first attempt.