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Chopin: The Poet of the Piano Jixin Zhou Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin(1810 – 1849) is a Polish composer. As one of the most famous representatives of the Romantic period, he combined a gift for melody, an adventurous harmonic sense, an intuitive and inventive understanding of formal design and fantastic piano techniques in composing a large body of piano music. Chopin was one of the leading 19th century composers who began a career as a pianist. He abandoned concert life early, but his music represents the spirit of the Romantic piano tradition and embodies more fully than any other composers with the expressive and technical characteristics of his instruments. (Arthur Hedley and Maurice J.E. Brown) People often referred to him as “the poet of the piano” and he is also considered one of the most famous composers of the Romantic Period. (Biography) The wonder of Chopin's music is the way he conjured new sounds from the piano. His pieces explore the full expressive range of the instrument, and he had the ability to create a kind of musical poetry. (Composers) Romanticism actually has very little to do with the popular thought of as “romantic”. Though love may sometimes be the theme of Romantic art, it is rather an international artistic and philosophical movement that redefines the foundational ways in which Western people thought about themselves and the whole world. (Introduction to Romanticism) What makes Chopin a romantic composer? What are some of the characteristics of Romantic music? How do his works demonstrate Romanticism? Classicism is conservatism in creativity with emphasis on balance, control, proportion, symmetry and retrains. On the other hand, Romanticism is a more radical kind of expression as it tries to find the new, the curious, and the adventurous, which Chopin exemplifies perfectly. (M.Tevfik Dorak) Romantic Music breaks barriers of limitation and Chopin was one to abandon the concrete forms of earlier music. Even though Mozart and Beethoven varied from the usual forms, Romantic composers, including Chopin, almost ignored them. (Arthur Hedley and Maurice J.E. Brown) Since the beginning of his composition, Chopin tried to avoid the rules and boundaries from the Classic Period and he broke the limitations and composed in various formats and styles. As a pianist he was almost self-taught, which may account for his lack of slavish reverence for tradition in his approach of the piano; his inventiveness and creativity were never inhibited by pedantry. (Arthur Hedley and Maurice J.E. Brown) The ballades Chopin composed are the best examples of this approach. Music up till this point was not based on literature nor had thematic material that depicted a story. The use of program music to paint pictures, tell a story, mimic poetry signified the cross form Classical to Romantic. Some of Chopin’s ballades helped to lift this movement. The program music to describe characters and tell stories allowed music to express a deeper level of emotion the audience could understand. Chopin’s Mazurka Themes are from the polish dance, and the nocturnes are a clear example of programmatic material too. (Arthur Hedley and Maurice J.E. Brown) As Chopin grew up, he got exhausted about the resources of his native city Warsaw, so he decided to go to Vienna. The public was impressed by his brilliant performances of classical music, and even more by his improvisation on a Polish folksong, an exotic novelty for the Viennese. The enthusiastic reception of Chopin’s compositions that were marked by a frankly Polish character and his meeting with other experts had encouraged him to write music that would contain both this national coloring and his own special piano style. Soon he returned to Warsaw and once again, among the whirl of the Romantic Movement, he felt narrow-minded and went to Paris. His imaginative playing and the unusual charm of his personality at once gained him many friends in both literary and musical circles, including Liszt, Berlioz, Hiller, Bellini and Meyerbeer and so was at the center of the Romantic movement. (Arthur Hedley and Maurice J.E. Brown) Like many of the Romantic artists, writers and composers who were inspired by the French Revolution or American Revolution, Chopin obtained his sources of creation from a significant history event like The November Uprising. The November Uprising (1830–1831)—also known as the Cadet Revolution—was an armed rebellion against Russia's rule in Poland. It was started on November 29, 1830 in Warsaw by a group of young conspirators from the army's officer school in Warsaw and was soon joined by large part of the Polish society. (November Uprising) Chopin was one of the first known nationalist composers. He loves his country so much that he even wanted to go back to Poland and fight there himself if his friends didn’t manage to stop him. Chopin was inspired by his country so much and he wrote several songs for this subject. In his songs he went further by allying his music to Polish words. Some of them are like mazurkas, some are in other simple, folk-like forms. He also used the themes and dances of his native country as resources to create many songs, especially the polonaises and mazurkas. (M.Tevfik Dorak) One of his most famous creations is the “Polonaise Op.53”, also known as “Héroique” is a very good example of his love for his country. The song first describes how prosperous and magnificent Poland used to be and then it talks about people’s misery and suffering under the control of Russia. One major category of compositions Chopin is Etudes. The term “étude” has long been used to describe compositions of technical, sometimes virtuosic, difficulty, focused on training and refining a specific aspect of a performer’s technique. Masters such as Czerny and Hanon wrote famous etudes that are legendary exercises in finger and hand dexterity and strength. Although invaluable in this regard, these etudes are lacking in musical development, since most of them are merely repetitions of the same general pattern of notes; they have no inherent musicality. (Yu, Fred) Chopin’s etudes are special in this sense. Chopin was the first to transform the etude into an actual art form. Although all of his twenty-seven etudes for piano adhere to the basic principle of an etude – to train and refine a specific aspect of a performer’s technique – there is another element present. Each of the etudes, rather than being a dry repetitive exercise, has its own musical story to tell. Like virtually all of Chopin’s compositions, there is an emotional aspect that transcends the mere playing of notes, and takes a true virtuoso to execute well. This newly developed musical aspect of the etude persisted as a feature of Romantic repertoire; among the other great Romantics, Liszt was particularly famous for his technically intense yet passionate concert etudes. (Yu, Fred) One should also note that while each of the etudes focus on a specific aspect of the performer’s technique, a common thread ties all of them together. Even though the Etude Op. 10 No. 1 is a difficult exercise in broad chords and the Etude Op. 25 No. 10 is more of a study for octave technique, they share something in common. Each of Chopin’s twenty-seven etudes, in addition to what each specifically focuses on, is an exercise designed to develop a legato style of playing. (Yu, Fred) Other than his etudes, Chopin is also well known for his nocturnes, preludes and waltz. People often use words such as "Songs of the night" to describe Chopin's nocturnes. They are piano miniatures among the most well known and most beautiful of Chopin's works. The genre of the piano nocturne was created by the Irish composer and pianist John Field. Chopin was introduced to nocturnes by his teacher Josef Elsner and was fascinated by the works of John Field. Chopin fully took the name and the broad concept of a dream-like melody over a broken chord backing, relying on liberal use of the sustain pedal and the offset of a contrasting middle section before a reprise of the opening material, and made it famous in the piano literature. The nocturne, perfectly suited to the mood of the era, evokes with its very name romantic images of the night, the moon, and all the shades of lyrical and dramatic expression associated with them. Its poetry is shaped by an atmosphere of intimacy and reverie. Other famous nocturnes were written by Clementi, Ries, Szymanowska, Kalkbrenner, Schumann and Liszt, among others, but it was Chopin, above all, who raised the nocturne to the peak of poetry, becoming its most celebrated master. (Nocturnes - Frédéric Chopin) Originally, preludes are compositions that are created to serve as short passages that went before something bigger, perhaps to set the mood. However, Chopin tried something new: he did not put anything after the preludes and let them stand alone. Chopin composed 24 short preludes. They are all really short, with the longest prelude (the famous “Raindrop” prelude) being five-minute long. Despite their lengths, the preludes became masterpieces as well. (Chopin Preludes) The best word to describe Chopin’s preludes is probably “enigmatic”. The preludes engage the listeners wholly in not a picture or an image, but rather a complete experience. Each prelude presents a distinct, discrete musical idea. Surely, one must admit that those preludes are rather strange. Nowhere else can one find such a diverse collection of music so strange and yet so entrancing. As such, they are also wonderfully fascinating and exceptionally hard to master. They are a set of extremely diverse pieces that include nearly all of Chopin’s stylistic quirks considering as a whole. Therefore, to play the whole set demands an intimate familiarity with Chopin’s style. To master the entire set is to have captured the spirit of the master’s music, and is exceedingly difficult. When considering these preludes, it is absolutely crucial to note that Chopin was strongly opposed to programmatic music. Programmatic music was simply not part of Chopin’s musical ideology. It had never occurred to him that music could represent images and it was never his intent to do so either. To Chopin, his music represented abstract ideas and feelings, transcending visual, earthly images. As a final point to note concerning preludes, Chopin did not write technical difficulties for the sake of writing technical difficulties. Unlike Liszt, who notoriously sought to make a great portion of his compositions incredibly difficult, Chopin did not consciously do this. If the piece is difficult, it is because it could not possibly have been written in any other way. There was no intent to make the piece hard just for the sake of its being hard; the mechanical difficulties of Chopin are as much a part of the music as the musical qualities themselves are. Chopin used only as much technical difficulty as was needed to express his ideas, and none beyond that. This is why his preludes vary so greatly in their technical demands. (Yu, Fred) During Chopin’s time, Waltz became very popular, both as a dance and as saloon music. No worthy middle-class home could afford to be without the piano and the Waltz was the perfect piece for the pretty daughter or wife to play. The dance was intimate and one cannot help to reflect how uneasy mothers and fathers were, watching their daughter in familiarly arms of a stranger. The grace sweeps and closes body carriage in which the freedom is returned to the females. Chopin himself had poured scorn on the Waltz, writing home from Vienna. “They actually call Waltzes works”. And so eventually did he as the businessman he was. His own Waltzes undoubtedly reached their finest flowering in Paris but he first discovered the form in Warsaw. He took special pains over the structure and continuity and the organic principle of developing variations lies in one way or the other behind most of them. Musical analysts can expose layer upon layer of thematic correspondences and derivations, which are useful to reveal the inner unconscious logic of the compositional process. (Ståhlbrand, Robert) Chopin’s inspiration comes from a lot of different resources. For example, Chopin’s friend circle of composers and poets had some influences over him and his creations. The fundamental texture of Chopin’s music is accompanied melody, and much of the fascination with his music comes from the limitless resources with which he varied it. Chopin’s most characteristic melodies can never be thought of without their accompaniments, which makes them pianistic. Nevertheless, they had much in common with the vocal melodies of the contemporary Italian operas. The similarity of Chopin’s nocturnes to Bellini’s cavatinas has often been noticed, though there is little evidence of direct influence in either direction. The influence of Rossini’s and Weber’s operatic melodies is apparent. In the matter of musical form Chopin has always been underestimated. Like other Romantics, he has been accused of inattention to musical structure or not being able to develop his materials in a larger scale. (Nicholas Temperley 306) Also, some say that Chopin’s Ballades are based off of his friends’ poetry. All Romantic composers composed some vocal music. For Chopin, he wrote a few songs based on Polish poetry. There are definitely more characteristics of Romantic music, but those above are instrumental in the change from Classical to Romantic and are elements that are evident in the work’s of Chopin. (Arthur Hedley and Maurice J.E. Brown) Another source of inspiration for Chopin’s composition comes from his love for his country. Like many of the Romantic artists, writers and composers who were inspired by the French Revolution or American Revolution, Chopin obtained his sources of creation from a significant history event like The November Uprising. The November Uprising (1830–1831)—also known as the Cadet Revolution—was an armed rebellion against Russia's rule in Poland. It was started on November 29, 1830 in Warsaw by a group of young conspirators from the army's officer school in Warsaw and was soon joined by large part of the Polish society. (November Uprising) Chopin was one of the first known nationalist composers. He loves his country so much that he even wanted to go back to Poland and fight there himself if his friends didn’t manage to stop him. Chopin was inspired by his country so much and he wrote several songs for this subject. In his songs he went further by allying his music to Polish words. Some of them are like mazurkas, some are in other simple, folk-like forms. He also used the themes and dances of his native country as resources to create many songs, especially the polonaises and mazurkas. (M.Tevfik Dorak) One of his most famous creations is the “Polonaise Op.53”, also known as “Héroique” is a very good example of his love for his country. The song first describes how prosperous and magnificent Poland used to be and then it talks about people’s misery and suffering under the control of Russia. Chopin is also known for his passion for piano. His real love was only for the piano, and all efforts to direct his energies to composition for other instruments or within Classical forms were vain. His characteristic qualities appeared as soon as he was allowed to follow his natural bent and compose for himself as a performer. (Arthur Hedley and Maurice J.E. Brown) Overall, Chopin is definitely a notable figure in the Romantic Period and qualifies as one of the most famous representatives of Romanticism. Although he is long gone, his works will remain in this world forever. Work Cited "Chopin Preludes." Classical Composers - Biographies of Music Geniuses. Web. 28 Jan. 2011. <http://www.favorite-classical-composers.com/chopin-preludes.html>. “Composers” Essential of Music 21 May 2009 http://www.essentialsofmusic.com/composer/chopin.html Hedley, Arthur and Brown J.E. Maurice (Sect 1—6) Nicholas Temperley (Sect 7— 14) “Chopin, Fryderyk Franciszek” The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. London: McMillan, 1980. "Introduction to Romanticism" Romanticism. 21 May 2009 <http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/rom.html>. Kuhn, Laura. Student Encyclopedia of Music. New York: Schirmer, 1999. M.Tevfik Dorak. “Romantic period music” <http://members.tripod.com/~dorakmt/music/romantic.html> "Nocturnes - Frédéric Chopin." Piano Society. Web. 28 Jan. 2011. <http://www.pianosociety.com/cms/index.php?section=129>. “November Uprising” Economic expert.com 21 May 2009 <http://www.economicexpert.com/a/November:Uprising.htm> Smolenska-Zielinska, Barbara. “Biography” Chopin: The Poet of The Piano 21 May 2009 <http://www.ourchopin.com/> Ståhlbrand, Robert. "Research, Chopin's Waltzes." Piano Society. Web. 28 Jan. 2011. <http://www.pianosociety.com/cms/index.php?section=633>. Yu, Fred. "Chopin : Complete Music Analysis - Etudes." CHOPIN : THE POET OF THE PIANO. Web. 24 Jan. 2011. <http://www.ourchopin.com/analysis/etude.html>. Yu, Fred. "Chopin : Complete Music Analysis - Preludes." CHOPIN : THE POET OF THE PIANO. Web. 28 Jan. 2011. <http://www.ourchopin.com/analysis/prelude.html>.