   #copyright

Frédéric Chopin

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Performers and composers

   The only known photograph of Frédéric Chopin, believed to have been
   taken by Louis-Auguste Bisson in 1849. (It is commonly mistaken for a
   daguerreotype.)
   The only known photograph of Frédéric Chopin, believed to have been
   taken by Louis-Auguste Bisson in 1849. (It is commonly mistaken for a
   daguerreotype.)

   Frédéric Chopin ( Polish: Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin, sometimes Szopen;
   French: Frédéric François Chopin; English surname pronunciation: IPA:
   /ʃoʊpæn/ or /ʃoʊpæ̃/; March 1, 1810, Żelazowa Wola –  October 17, 1849,
   Paris) was a Polish piano composer of the Romantic period. He is widely
   regarded as one of the most famous, influential and prolific composers
   for piano.

   Chopin was born in the village of Żelazowa Wola, Poland, to a Polish
   mother and French- expatriate father. Hailed in his homeland as a child
   prodigy, at age twenty Chopin left for Paris. There he made a career as
   performer, teacher and composer, and adopted the French version of his
   given names, "Frédéric-François." From 1837 to 1847 he had a turbulent
   relationship with the French writer George Sand (Aurore Dudevant).
   Always in frail health, at 39 he succumbed to pulmonary tuberculosis.

   All of Chopin's extant work includes the piano in some role
   (predominantly as a solo instrument), and his compositions are widely
   considered to be among the pinnacles of the piano's repertoire.
   Although his music is among the most technically demanding for the
   instrument, Chopin's style emphasizes nuance and expressive depth
   rather than mere technical display. He invented some musical forms,
   such as the ballade, but his most significant innovations were within
   existing structures such as the piano sonata, waltz, nocturne, étude,
   and prelude. His works are often cited as being among the mainstays of
   Romanticism in 19th-century classical music. Additionally, Chopin was
   the first western classical composer to imbue Slavic elements into his
   music; to this day his mazurkas and polonaises are the cornerstone of
   Polish nationalistic classical music.

Life

   Chopin's birthplace at Żelazowa Wola. Piano recitals are performed
   here.
   Chopin's birthplace at Żelazowa Wola. Piano recitals are performed
   here.

   Chopin was born in Żelazowa Wola, near Sochaczew in the Masovia region,
   which was part of the Duchy of Warsaw. He was born to Mikołaj (Nicolas)
   Chopin, a Frenchman of distant Polish ancestry from Lorraine who had
   adopted Poland as his homeland when he moved there in 1787. Nicolas had
   married a woman from an upper-class but impoverished Polish family,
   Tekla Justyna Krzyżanowska.

   According to the composer's family, Chopin was born March 1, 1810.
   There is no known birth certificate. His baptismal certificate lists
   his birthdate as February 22, 1810, but this was most likely an error
   on the part of the priest.

Formative years

   In October 1810, when Frédéric was seven months old, the family moved
   to Warsaw, where the father took a position as teacher of French
   language at a high school housed in the Saxon Palace. The family lived
   on the palace grounds.
   Chopin, by Ary Scheffer.
   Chopin, by Ary Scheffer.

   Young Chopin, like his sisters, received his first piano lessons from
   his mother. His musical talent was early apparent, and he gained a
   reputation in Warsaw as a "second Mozart." At age seven he was already
   the author of two polonaises ( G minor and B flat major), the first
   being published in the engraving workshop of Father Cybulski, director
   of a School of Organists and one of the few music publishers in Poland.
   The prodigy was featured in the Warsaw newspapers, and "little Chopin"
   became an attraction at receptions given in the capital's aristocratic
   salons. He also began giving public charity concerts. He is said to
   once have been asked what he thought the audience liked best;
   seven-year-old Chopin replied, "My shirt collar." He first appeared
   publicly as a pianist when he was eight.

   Chopin received his first professional piano lessons, in 1816-22, from
   Wojciech Żywny. Chopin later spoke highly of Żywny, although the
   youngster's skills soon surpassed those of his teacher. The further
   development of Chopin's talent was supervised by Wilhelm Würfel. This
   renowned pianist, a professor at the Warsaw Conservatory, gave Chopin
   valuable though irregular lessons in playing the organ, and possibly
   also the piano. From 1823 to 1826 Chopin attended the Warsaw Lyceum, a
   high school where his father taught.

   In the autumn of 1826, Chopin began studying music theory, figured bass
   and composition with the composer Józef Elsner at the Warsaw
   Conservatory. Chopin's contact with Elsner may date to as early as
   1822, and it is certain that Elsner was giving Chopin informal guidance
   by 1823. Chopin completed a normal three-year course at the
   conservatory in 1829.
   "In this building lived and composed Fryderyk Chopin before, in 1830,
   leaving Warsaw forever." On same floor would live, in 1837-39, Cyprian
   Norwid, author of poem "Chopin's Piano," about 1863 destruction of
   Chopin's piano by Russian troops.
   "In this building lived and composed Fryderyk Chopin before, in 1830,
   leaving Warsaw forever." On same floor would live, in 1837-39, Cyprian
   Norwid, author of poem "Chopin's Piano," about 1863 destruction of
   Chopin's piano by Russian troops.

   That same year in Warsaw, Chopin heard Niccolò Paganini play, and he
   also met the German pianist and composer Johann Nepomuk Hummel. It was
   also in 1829 that Chopin met his first love, a singing student named
   Konstancja Gładkowska. This inspired Chopin to put the melody of the
   human voice into his works.

   In August 1829, three weeks after leaving the Warsaw Conservatory,
   Chopin made a brilliant debut in Vienna. He gave two piano performances
   and received many very favorable reviews, along with others that
   criticized the small tone that he produced from the piano.

   In Warsaw in December 1829 he performed the premiere of his Piano
   Concerto in F minor at the Merchants' Club. He gave the first
   performance of his other piano concerto, in E minor, at the National
   Theatre on March 17, 1830.

   On November 2, 1830, Chopin left Warsaw to give concerts in western
   Europe, never to return to Poland. At month's end the November 1830
   Uprising broke out, and his traveling companion Titus Woyciechowski
   went home to take part. Chopin stayed in Vienna, tortured by anxiety
   for his loved ones, then visited Munich and Stuttgart (where he learned
   of Poland's occupation by the Russian army; see Congress Poland) and
   arrived in Paris by October 1831. He had already composed a body of
   important compositions, including his two piano concertos and some of
   his Études Op. 10.

Paris

   Chopin, by Francesco Hayez, 1833.
   Chopin, by Francesco Hayez, 1833.

   In Paris, Chopin was welcomed by eminent Polish exiles and by leading
   artists such as Heinrich Heine, Alfred de Vigny and Eugène Delacroix.
   He was introduced to some of the foremost pianists of the day,
   including Friedrich Kalkbrenner, Ferdinand Hiller and Franz Liszt, and
   he formed personal friendships with composers Hector Berlioz, Felix
   Mendelssohn, Charles-Valentin Alkan and Vincenzo Bellini (beside whom
   he is buried in the Père Lachaise Cemetery). Chopin's music was already
   admired by many of his composer contemporaries, among them Robert
   Schumann who, in his review of the Variations on "La ci darem la mano"
   (from Mozart's opera Don Giovanni), Op. 2, wrote: "Hats off, gentlemen!
   A genius."

   During his years in Paris, Chopin participated in a number of concerts.
   The programs provide some idea of the richness of Parisian artistic
   life during this period, such as the concert on March 23, 1833, in
   which Chopin, Liszt and Hiller played the solo parts in a performance
   of Johann Sebastian Bach's concerto for three harpsichords, and the
   concert on March 3, 1838, when Chopin, Alkan, Alkan's teacher Pierre
   Joseph Zimmerman and Chopin's pupil Adolphe Gutman played Alkan's
   8-hand arrangement of Beethoven's 7th symphony.

   A distinguished English amateur described seeing Chopin at a salon:
   Chopin ca. 1833, by A. Weger.
   Chopin ca. 1833, by A. Weger.

   “  Imagine a delicate man of extreme refinement of mien and manner,
     sitting at the piano and playing with no sway of the body and scarcely
      any movement of the arms, depending entirely upon his narrow feminine
         hand and slender fingers. The wide arpeggios in the left hand,
     maintained in a continuous stream of tone by the strict legato and fine
     and constant use of the damper pedal, formed a harmonious substructure
        for a wonderfully poetic cantabile. His delicate pianissimo, the
      ever-changing modifications of tone and time ( tempo rubato) were of
        indescribable effect. Even in energetic passages he scarcely ever
                        exceeded an ordinary mezzoforte.                    ”

   From Paris, Chopin made various visits and tours. In 1834, with Hiller,
   he visited a Rhenish Music Festival at Aachen organized by Ferdinand
   Ries. Here Chopin and Hiller met up with Mendelssohn, and the three
   went on to visit Düsseldorf, Koblenz and Cologne, enjoying each other's
   company and learning and playing music together.

   In 1835 Chopin visited his family in Karlsbad, whence he accompanied
   his parents to Děčín where they lived. He returned to Paris via
   Dresden, where he stayed for some weeks, and then Leipzig where he met
   up with Mendelssohn, Schumann and Clara Wieck. However, on the return
   journey he had a severe bronchial attack — so bad that he was reported
   dead in some Polish newspapers.

   In 1836 Chopin became engaged to a seventeen-year-old Polish girl,
   Maria Wodzińska, whose mother insisted that the engagement be kept
   secret. The following year the engagement was called off by her family.

Chopin and Sand

   Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin, by his friend Eugène Delacroix (1838).
   Originally this and the George Sand portrait below were parts of a
   double portrait showing both.
   Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin, by his friend Eugène Delacroix (1838).
   Originally this and the George Sand portrait below were parts of a
   double portrait showing both.
   George Sand by Eugène Delacroix
   George Sand by Eugène Delacroix

   In 1836, at a party hosted by Countess Marie d'Agoult, mistress of
   fellow-composer Franz Liszt, Chopin met Amandine-Aurore-Lucile Dupin,
   Baroness Dudevant, better known by her pseudonym, George Sand. She was
   a French Romantic writer noted for her numerous love affairs with
   Prosper Mérimée, Alfred de Musset (1833–34), her secretary Alexandre
   Manceau (1849–65) and others.

   Chopin initially did not find her attractive. "Something about her
   repels me," he told his family. Sand, however, in an extraordinary June
   1837 letter to her friend Count Wojciech Grzymała, debated whether to
   let Chopin go with his fiancée Maria Wodzińska or to abandon another
   affair in order to begin a relationship with Chopin. Sand had strong
   feelings for Chopin and pursued him until a relationship developed.

   A notable episode in their time together was a turbulent and miserable
   winter on Mallorca (1838–1839), where they had problems finding
   habitable accommodation and ended up lodging in the scenic but stark
   and cold Valldemossa monastery. Chopin also had problems having his
   Pleyel piano sent to him. It arrived from Paris after a great delay, to
   be stuck at Spanish customs, which demanded a large import duty. He
   could use it for little more than three weeks; the rest of the time he
   had to compose on a rickety rented piano to complete his Preludes (Op.
   28).
   Chopin's piano, Valldemossa, Mallorca.
   Chopin's piano, Valldemossa, Mallorca.

   During the winter, the bad weather had such a serious effect on
   Chopin's health and his chronic lung disease that – to save his life –
   he, George Sand and her two children were compelled to return first to
   the Spanish mainland where they reached Barcelona, and then to
   Marseille where they stayed for a few months to recover. Although his
   health improved, he never completely recovered from this bout. He
   complained, with his habitual wit, about the incompetence of the
   doctors in Mallorca: "The first said I was going to die; the second
   said I had breathed my last; and the third said I was already dead."

   Chopin spent the summers of 1839 until 1843 at Sand's estate in Nohant.
   These were quiet but productive days during which Chopin composed many
   works. They included his great Polonaise in A-flat major, Op.53
   "Heroic," still one of his most famous pieces. On Chopin's return to
   Paris in 1839, he met the pianist and composer Ignaz Moscheles.

   In 1845 a serious problem emerged in Chopin's relationship with Sand at
   the same time as a further deterioration occurred in his health. Their
   relationship was further soured in 1846 by family problems; this was
   the year in which Sand published Lucrezia Floriani, which is quite
   unfavorable to Chopin. The story is about a rich actress and a prince
   with weak health, and it is possible to interpret the main characters
   as Sand and Chopin. In 1847 the family problems finally brought an end
   to their relationship.

Death and funeral

   Warsaw's Holy Cross Church. Chopin's bust is on left-most pillar, which
   encloses his heart.
   Warsaw's Holy Cross Church. Chopin's bust is on left-most pillar, which
   encloses his heart.
   Chopin's grave in Paris' Père Lachaise Cemetery.
   Chopin's grave in Paris' Père Lachaise Cemetery.
   Plaque before Chopin's heart.
   Plaque before Chopin's heart.

   In 1848 Chopin gave his last concert in Paris, and visited England and
   Scotland with his student and admirer Jane Stirling. They reached
   London in November, and although Chopin managed to give some concerts
   and salon performances, he was severely ill. He returned to Paris,
   where in 1849 he became unable to teach or perform. His sister Ludwika
   nursed him in his apartment at Place Vendôme, 12, where he died in the
   small hours of October 17. Later that morning, a death mask and a cast
   of Chopin's hands were made by the young sculptor, Jean Baptiste
   Clesinger.

   Before his funeral, Chopin's heart was removed, to be taken by his
   sister in an urn to Warsaw, where it remains sealed within a pillar of
   the Holy Cross Church (Kościół Świętego Krzyża) on Krakowskie
   Przedmieście.

   Chopin had requested that Mozart's Requiem be sung at his funeral. The
   Requiem has major parts for female singers, but the chosen church, the
   Church of the Madeleine, had never permitted female singers in its
   choir. The funeral was delayed for almost two weeks, until the church
   finally relented and granted Chopin's final wish, provided the female
   singers remained behind a black velvet curtain. The funeral was held on
   30 October and was attended by nearly three thousand people. The
   soloists in the Requiem included the bass Luigi Lablache, who had sung
   the same work at the funeral of Beethoven and also sang at the funeral
   of Bellini. Preludes No. 4 in E minor and No. 6 in B minor were also
   played. He was buried at the Père Lachaise Cemetery, also at his own
   request. At the graveside, the Funeral March from the Sonata Op. 35 was
   played, in Napoléon Henri Reber's instrumentation. Later, some of
   Chopin's Polish friends journeyed to Paris with a jar of earth from
   their native land and scattered it over his grave, so that Chopin would
   lie under Polish soil. His grave attracts numerous visitors and is
   invariably festooned with flowers, even in the dead of winter.

Music

   Chopin's music for the piano combined a unique rhythmic sense
   (particularly his use of rubato), frequent use of chromaticism, and
   counterpoint. This mixture produces a particularly fragile sound in the
   melody and the harmony, which are nonetheless underpinned by solid and
   interesting harmonic techniques. He took the new salon genre of the
   nocturne, invented by Irish composer John Field, to a deeper level of
   sophistication. Three of his twenty-one nocturnes were only published
   after his death in 1849, contrary to his wishes. He also endowed
   popular dance forms, such as the Polish mazurka and the Viennese waltz,
   with a greater range of melody and expression. Chopin was the first to
   write ballades and scherzi as individual pieces. Chopin also took the
   example of Bach's preludes and fugues, transforming the genre in his
   own preludes.

   Several of Chopin's pieces have become very well known — for instance
   the Revolutionary Étude (Op. 10, No. 12), the Minute Waltz
   (Op. 64, No. 1), and the third movement of his Funeral March sonata
   (Op. 35), which is often used as an iconic representation of grief. The
   Revolutionary Étude was not written with the failed Polish uprising
   against Russia in mind; it merely appeared at that time. The Funeral
   March was written before the rest of the sonata within which it is
   contained, but the exact occasion is not known; it appears not to have
   been inspired by any specific personal bereavement. Other melodies have
   been used as the basis of popular songs, such as the slow section of
   the Fantaisie-Impromptu (Op. 66) and the first section of the Étude
   Op. 10 No. 3. These pieces often rely on an intense and personalised
   chromaticism, as well as a melodic curve that resembles the operas of
   Chopin's day — the operas of Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, and
   especially Bellini. Chopin used the piano to re-create the gracefulness
   of the singing voice, and talked and wrote constantly about singers.
   Chopin, drawn by Franz Xavier Winterhalter, 1847.
   Chopin, drawn by Franz Xavier Winterhalter, 1847.

   Chopin's style and gifts became increasingly influential. Robert
   Schumann was a huge admirer of Chopin's music — although the feeling
   was not reciprocated — and he took melodies from Chopin and even named
   a piece from his suite Carnaval after Chopin.

   Franz Liszt, another great admirer and personal friend of the composer,
   transcribed for piano six of Chopin's Polish songs. However, one myth
   about Liszt's admiration for Chopin should be dispelled. In 1853, Liszt
   published a piano suite called Harmonies Poétiques et Religieuses. The
   seventh movement, Funérailles, is subtitled "October 1849". That this
   was the month of Chopin's death, and that the middle section seems to
   be modelled upon the famous octave trio section of Chopin's Polonaise
   in A-flat major, Op. 53, have led many to presume that Liszt wrote the
   piece in memory of Chopin. However, Liszt denied this, saying the piece
   had been inspired by the deaths of three of his Hungarian compatriots
   in the same month.

   Chopin performed his own works in concert halls but most often in his
   salon for friends. Only later in life, as his disease progressed, did
   Chopin give up public performance altogether.

   Chopin's technical innovations also became influential. His Préludes
   (Op. 28) and Études (Opp. 10 and 25) rapidly became standard works, and
   inspired both Liszt's Transcendental Études and Schumann's Symphonic
   Études. Alexander Scriabin was also strongly influenced by Chopin; for
   example, his 24 Preludes, Op. 11 are inspired by Chopin's Op. 28.

   Jeremy Siepmann, in his biography of the composer, named a list of
   pianists he believed to have made recordings of works by Chopin
   generally acknowledged to be among the greatest Chopin performances
   ever preserved: Vladimir de Pachmann, Raoul Pugno, Ignacy Jan
   Paderewski, Moriz Rosenthal, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Alfred Cortot, Ignaz
   Friedman, Raoul Koczalski, Arthur Rubinstein, Mieczysław Horszowski,
   Claudio Arrau, Vlado Perlemuter, Vladimir Horowitz, Dinu Lipatti,
   Vladimir Ashkenazy, Martha Argerich, Maurizio Pollini, Murray Perahia,
   Krystian Zimerman, Evgeny Kissin.

   Rubinstein said the following about Chopin's music and its
   universality:

   “ Chopin was a genius of universal appeal. His music conquers the most
       diverse audiences. When the first notes of Chopin sound through the
      concert hall there is a happy sigh of recognition. All over the world
      men and women know his music. They love it. They are moved by it. Yet
        it is not "Romantic music" in the Byronic sense. It does not tell
      stories or paint pictures. It is expressive and personal, but still a
        pure art. Even in this abstract atomic age, where emotion is not
       fashionable, Chopin endures. His music is the universal language of
     human communication. When I play Chopin I know I speak directly to the
                               hearts of people!                           ”

Style

   Although Chopin lived in the 1800s, he was educated in the tradition of
   Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart and Clementi; he even used Clementi's piano
   method with his own students. He was also influenced by Hummel's
   development of virtuoso, yet Mozartian, piano technique. One of his
   students, Friederike Muller, wrote the following in her diary about
   Chopin's playing style:
   Chopin, drawn by Rudolph Lehmann, 1847.
   Chopin, drawn by Rudolph Lehmann, 1847.

  “   His playing was always noble and beautiful; his tones sang, whether
        in full forte or softest piano. He took infinite pains to teach his
          pupils this legato, cantabile style of playing. His most severe
    criticism was "He—or she—does not know how to join two notes together."
         He also demanded the strictest adherence to rhythm. He hated all
         lingering and dragging, misplaced rubatos, as well as exaggerated
       ritardandos ... and it is precisely in this respect that people make
                    such terrible errors in playing his works.                 ”

   Chopin's polonaises brought the musical form to a higher level than
   anyone had envisioned the musical style to be capable of. The series of
   seven polonaises published in his lifetime (another nine were published
   posthumously), beginning with the Op. 26 pair, set a whole new standard
   for composing and playing the music and were rooted in a passion by
   Chopin to write something to celebrate Polish culture — after the
   country had fallen back into the Russian grip. The A major polonaise
   Op. 40 No. 1, "Military," and the polonaise in A flat major Op. 53,
   "Heroic," are among Chopin's most beloved and played works.

Romanticism

   Chopin regarded most of his contemporaries with some indifference,
   although he had many acquaintances with those associated with
   romanticism in music, literature and the arts, (many of them via his
   liaison with George Sand). Chopin's music is however considered by many
   to be a peak of the Romantic style. The relative classical purity and
   discretion in his music, with little extravagant exhibitionism, partly
   reflects his reverence of Bach and Mozart. (Chopin based the sequence
   of his Preludes on the Well-Tempered Clavier of Bach). Chopin also
   never indulged in explicit 'scene painting' in his music, or used
   programmatic titles, castigating publishers who renamed his pieces in
   this way.

Works

   Polish 5,000-złoty banknote, 1974 series, featuring Chopin's likeness.
   Polish 5,000- złoty banknote, 1974 series, featuring Chopin's likeness.

   All Chopin's works involve the piano, solo or accompanied. They are
   predominantly for solo piano, but include a small number of piano
   ensembles with instruments, including a second piano, violin, cello,
   voice or orchestra.

   Over 230 of Chopin's works survive. Various manuscripts and pieces from
   early childhood have been lost.

Chopin in popular culture

   Statue of Frédéric Chopin in Warsaw's Łazienki Park.
   Statue of Frédéric Chopin in Warsaw's Łazienki Park.
   Sunday concert at Chopin statue. White canopy (right) shelters pianist.
   Sunday concert at Chopin statue. White canopy (right) shelters pianist.
     * A statue of Chopin was erected before World War II in Warsaw's
       Łazienki Park. At its base, in summer, free piano recitals of
       Chopin's compositions are performed on Sundays. The stylized tree
       over Chopin's figure echoes a pianist's hand and fingers.
     * In commemoration of the genius of Frédéric Chopin, the
       International Frederick Chopin Piano Competition is held every five
       years in Warsaw.
     * The Grand prix du disque de F.Chopin is awarded periodically for
       notable Chopin recordings, both remastered and newly-recorded work.

Eponyms

   The following have been named after the composer:
     * Asteroid 3784 Chopin
     * Warsaw Frederic Chopin Airport (also known as Frederic Chopin
       International Airport)

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