{"id":46905,"date":"2024-08-26T11:30:00","date_gmt":"2024-08-26T09:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/f10394c0-d1a7-4d29-9f66-1dbc590518f4"},"modified":"2024-08-26T12:07:16","modified_gmt":"2024-08-26T10:07:16","slug":"frederic-chopin-he-was-the-quintessential-romantic-artist-but-he-was-also-a-tricky-character-to-be-around","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/rss_feed\/frederic-chopin-he-was-the-quintessential-romantic-artist-but-he-was-also-a-tricky-character-to-be-around\/","title":{"rendered":"Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric Chopin: he was the quintessential Romantic artist. But he was also a tricky character to be around"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By <\/p>

Published: Monday, 26 August 2024 at 09:30 AM<\/p>

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Few figures have had so profound an influence on the Romantic era as the Polish composer and pianist Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric Chopin (1810-1849). Born in Poland and later settling in Paris, Chopin devoted almost all of his composing energies to pieces for solo piano. His works are rightly famed for their lyrical beauty, dazzling technique, and deep emotional expressiveness. Here’s an introduction to the life and times of this great, but troubled Romantic. <\/p>

Who was Chopin?<\/h2>
Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric Fran\u00e7ois Chopin (born Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin) was one of the 19th century’s most important composers, as well as a virtuoso pianist. Most of his output is for solo piano, and it includes some of the instrument’s best known and best loved repertoire.<\/p>
Think of Chopin and you might consider first his passion for his native Poland while in Parisian exile. Schumann<\/a><\/strong>\u2019s remark about Chopin\u2019s mazurkas containing \u2018guns buried in flowers\u2019 has much to do with this; besides, the delicate pianist-composer\u2019s first childhood scribbling was a polonaise and his dying notes a chromatic, heartbreaking mazurka.<\/p>
<\/div><\/figure><p>But that\u2019s not necessarily what makes Chopin so Chopinesque. Such forms were simply a springboard from which this musical visionary could launch himself into another world. Perhaps the heart of Chopin\u2019s music lies in his dark side: the subconscious, feverish, often tortured imagination which found its chief release in improvisation. He was a mass of paradoxes and contradictions, and his music blended diverse influences into a musical language that was of its day yet ultimately incomparable.<\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-when-and-where-was-chopin-born\">When and where was Chopin born?<\/h2><p>Chopin was born in the small Polish village of \u017belazowa Wola in the Duchy of Warsaw, Poland, on 1 March 1810.<\/p><p>The young Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric was a child prodigy, playing in public for the first time at the age of eight, having written his first polonaises a year earlier. He studied with Jozef Elsner at the Warsaw Conservatory and composed some enjoyable works for piano and orchestra while in his teens.<\/p><p>With emotional maturity, though, as he travelled more widely and as tuberculosis took hold of him, forcing him to live essentially on borrowed time, his music grew in emotional power and daring.<\/p><h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-a-musician-who-didn-t-like-performing\">A musician who didn’t like performing <\/h3><p>Paradox number one: Chopin was a musician who didn\u2019t like performing. He was in his element not in the concert hall playing preordained <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/musical-terms\/what-concerto\">concertos<\/a><\/strong> for mass audiences, but in the salon (see Henryk Siemiradzki’s 1887 painting of Chopin performing for the Radziwi\u0142\u0142s family in 1829, below), improvising for his friends, or alone. During the course of his short, blighted life, he gave only around 30 formal concerts. <\/p><ul><li><strong>We named Chopin one of our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/composers\/best-romantic-composers\/\">15 greatest Romantic composers<\/a><\/strong><\/li><\/ul><figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The Composer Chopin Playing in the Salon of Prince Radziville, Berlin, 1829, by Henryk Siemiradzki. Pic: Fine Art Photographic Library\/CORBIS\/Corbis via Getty Images – Fine Art Photographic Library\/CORBIS\/Corbis via Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure><p>When he performed in Paris in 1841, his lover, the novelist George Sand, wrote to their friend, the singer <a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/artists\/who-was-pauline-viardot\/\"><strong>Pauline Viardot<\/strong><\/a>, about his attitude: \u2018He does not want any poster, he does not want any programmes, he does not want a large audience,\u2019 she grumbled. \u2018He does not want anyone to talk about it. He is frightened of so many things that I have suggested to him that he should play without candles or audience on a dumb piano.\u2019<\/p><h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-fragile-fussy-and-precious\">‘Fragile, fussy and precious’<\/h3><p>In short, Chopin was no easy character. He was fragile, fussy and precious; he was oversensitive about his large nose; and he had a nasty streak of anti-Semitism. But let Chopin sit down at a piano and he was in his element.<\/p><p>He was never more his true self than in improvisation, and in those parts of his works where he evokes it: the passage in the Fourth Ballade in which he extends and distorts the timing of its most sensual melody over a shimmering wash of notes, for example, or the reverie in the Barcarolle before the return of the main theme, when the harmonies side-step downwards before the pianist\u2019s right hand flies away into filigree arabesques.<\/p><figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Krystian Zimerman - Chopin - Ballade No. 4 in F minor, Op. 52\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/pe-GrRQz8pk?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen=\"\"\/><\/div><\/figure><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-who-influenced-chopin\">Who influenced Chopin?<\/h2><p>On to the next paradox: underpinning Chopin\u2019s moments of freedom is a fixation with Classicism and the Baroque. His two greatest influences were <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/composers\/johann-sebastian-bach\/\">JS Bach<\/a><\/strong> and <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/composers\/mozart\/\">Mozart<\/a><\/strong>. Fans of <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Schenkerian_analysis\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Schenkerian analysis<\/a><\/strong>, exploring Chopin\u2019s music in terms of foreground, middle-ground and background, find it works consistently: Chopin\u2019s construction is meticulous, the proportions near perfect, the magical enharmonic shifts part and parcel of the musical intellect.<\/p><p>Add to this a very different language, the world of <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/articles\/what-bel-canto\/\">bel canto<\/a><\/strong> opera, especially <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/composers\/gaetano-donizetti\">Donizetti<\/a><\/strong>, <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/composers\/gioachino-rossini\/\">Rossini<\/a><\/strong> and <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/composers\/vincenzo-bellini\">Bellini<\/a><\/strong> (as a student, Chopin fell in love with a young singer, Konstancja Gladkowska and frequented the Warsaw opera house to hear her).<\/p><h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-counterpoint-melody-and-improvisation-all-achieve-unlikely-perfection\">‘Counterpoint, melody and improvisation all achieve unlikely perfection’<\/h3><p>The extended, much-decorated melodies that abound in Chopin\u2019s <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/musical-terms\/nocturne-definition\">nocturnes<\/a><\/strong>; his fondness for writing for two \u2018voices\u2019 in thirds and sixths; the dramatic \u2018recitative\u2019 passage over <em><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/musical-terms\/what-tremolo\">tremolando<\/a><\/strong><\/em> in the slow movement of his Second Piano Concerto \u2013 all these originate not in the practice room but in the opera house. In Chopin\u2019s hands, Bachian counterpoint, Bellini-esque melody and the sense of improvisation fuse to unlikely perfection.<\/p><p>The Four Ballades, the F minor Fantasie, the Polonaise-Fantasie, the Four Scherzos and even the Berceuse and Barcarolle all find Chopin taking off into imaginative wonders that far transcend the plain generic titles, but perhaps the apex of Chopin\u2019s fusion of sensibilities is his Sonata No. 2 in B flat minor.<\/p><figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embedwrapper\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Martha Argerich: The complete Piano sonata no. 2 in B-flat minor Op. 35"(Chopin)\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/69j7Ck4g1sc?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen=\"\"\/><\/div><\/figure><p>On the surface, it\u2019s classically constructed: first movement in <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/articles\/discovering-music-sonata-form\/\">sonata form<\/a><\/strong>, second movement a scherzo and trio, slow movement in ternary form, presto finale. But Chopin treats all that as a starting point, just as he does the mazurka, polonaise or waltz, filling the sonata with an elemental power that\u2019s taut, fearsome and more dramatic than most operas.<\/p><p>A 19th-century writer could easily have read into the first movement the galloping of the consumption in Chopin\u2019s lungs, or into the <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/articles\/what-scherzo\/\">Scherzo<\/a><\/strong> and trio delirious visions of an easeful death. The slow movement is unmistakably a funeral march; and the pianist Arthur Rubinstein famously described the skittering, mainly pianissimo finale with the hands in stark unison as \u2018the whistling wind over the graves\u2019. <\/p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-what-are-chopin-s-most-famous-works\">What are Chopin’s most famous works?<\/h2><p>Chopin’s best loved works include the Polonaises (and we’d start with No.3 in A major, the ‘Military’), the four passionate and stormy Ballades, the Piano Concerto No. 1, and the Mazurkas, in which the composer delivers his own typically dramatic and captivating interpretations of a traditional Polish dance.<\/p><p>Then there are the dreamy, twilit Nocturnes – relatively simple pieces compared to some of Chopin’s other compositions, with the left hand usually providing a steady rhythmic accompaniment to the songful, lyrical lines played by the right hand.<\/p><figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embedwrapper\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Chopin - Nocturne in C Sharp Minor (No. 20)\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/DqpPRj6UZqc?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen=\"\"\/><\/div><\/figure><ul><li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/works\/five-essential-works-chopin\/\">Five essential works by Chopin<\/a><\/strong><\/li><\/ul><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-who-are-the-best-chopin-interpreters\">Who are the best Chopin interpreters?<\/h2><p>Great Chopin interpreters include <a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/artists\/who-is-martha-argerich-all-you-need-to-know-about-the-brilliant-pianist\/\"><strong>Martha Argerich<\/strong><\/a>, Maurizio Pollini, Murray Perahia, Vladimir Horowitz, Vladimir Ashkenazy, and Maria Jo\u00e3o Pires. Two fellow Poles, Artur Rubinstein and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/news\/krystian-zimerman-among-recipients-of-praemium-imperiale-2022\/\"><strong>Krystian Zimerman<\/strong><\/a>, are also among the very finest performers of Chopin’s beautiful, dreamlike, often haunting piano music. <\/p><ul><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/artists\/20-greatest-pianists-all-time\/\"><strong>The 20 greatest pianists of all time<\/strong><\/a><\/li><li><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/features\/artists\/the-best-recordings-of-pianist-martha-argerich\/\">The best recordings of pianist Martha Argerich<\/a><\/strong><\/li><\/ul><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-when-did-chopin-die\">When did Chopin die?<\/h2><p>The prospect of Chopin\u2019s own grave was never far away. He was only 39 when he died on 17 October 1849. Pauline Viardot visited him on his deathbed and reported that \u2018the great ladies of Paris thought themselves obliged to come and faint in his room, which was congested with artists hastily making sketches\u2019.<\/p><h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-the-great-ladies-of-paris-thought-themselves-obliged-to-come-and-faint-in-his-room\">‘The great ladies of Paris thought themselves obliged to come and faint in his room’<\/h4><p>The only existing photograph of Chopin, thought to have been taken in the year of his death, shows him ill and suffering. The face is shadowy, hard and ravaged, the expression petulant, angry.<\/p><p>It\u2019s a world away from the effete, sensitive portraits by Eug\u00e8ne Delacroix and the other distinguished painters who had surrounded him: there\u2019s no mistaking the nature of those eyes. This, then, was the real creator of the B flat minor sonata and the 24 Preludes: the supposedly ethereal poet unmasked as a creature of fire.<\/p><p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.classical-music.com\/tag\/chopin-reviews\/\">Read reviews of the latest Chopin recordings here<\/a><\/strong><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n<hr class=\"no-tts wp-block-separator\"\/>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Published: Monday, 26 August 2024 at 09:30 AM Few figures have had so profound an influence on the Romantic era as the Polish composer and pianist Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric Chopin (1810-1849). Born in Poland and later settling in Paris, Chopin devoted almost all of his composing energies to pieces for solo piano. His works are rightly […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":46906,"template":"","categories":[1,17],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"7"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/frederic-chopin-he-was-the-quintessential-romantic-artist-but-he-was-also-a-tricky-character-to-be-around.jpg",1200,800,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/frederic-chopin-he-was-the-quintessential-romantic-artist-but-he-was-also-a-tricky-character-to-be-around-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/frederic-chopin-he-was-the-quintessential-romantic-artist-but-he-was-also-a-tricky-character-to-be-around-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/frederic-chopin-he-was-the-quintessential-romantic-artist-but-he-was-also-a-tricky-character-to-be-around-768x512.jpg",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/frederic-chopin-he-was-the-quintessential-romantic-artist-but-he-was-also-a-tricky-character-to-be-around-1024x683.jpg",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/frederic-chopin-he-was-the-quintessential-romantic-artist-but-he-was-also-a-tricky-character-to-be-around.jpg",1200,800,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/37\/2024\/08\/frederic-chopin-he-was-the-quintessential-romantic-artist-but-he-was-also-a-tricky-character-to-be-around.jpg",1200,800,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Published: Monday, 26 August 2024 at 09:30 AM Few figures have had so profound an influence on the Romantic era as the Polish composer and pianist Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric Chopin (1810-1849). Born in Poland and later settling in Paris, Chopin devoted almost all of his composing energies to pieces for solo piano. His works are rightly…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/46905"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcmusicmagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}