Nohant Manor -- Garden Entry from "Chopin's Europe" courtesy MUZA SA, Image copyright 2010 Hanna and Juliusz Komarnicki

As we know, Chopin, like Mozart and Beethoven before him, and Liszt among his contemporaries, was one of the greatest improvisers before the public. How his improvisations sounded, either public or private, in the darkness of his music salon, we will never know. It always seems to me that the closest we will ever come to hearing his musings at the piano is this single five minute Prelude, composed in 1841 in Nohant, and assigned the separate opus number 45. Sending his copyist, Julian Fontana, his manuscript (neither the autograph nor Fontana’s copy are extant), Chopin attached a note that this time (unlike in the case of the Tarantella, Op. 43) expressed a rarely shown satisfaction: “it is well modulated, isn’t it?” In this constant stream of modulations, with no specific form, the main theme and the accompaniment are intertwined. Toward the end comes a cadenza, with double notes in both hands, that a lead to an ecstatic culmination. The opening theme then reappears, and the piece dies away. Its character could be mistaken for that of a nocturne. The work was dedicated to one of Chopin’s female students, Countess Elizabeth Czernyszew. It is puzzling that this marvelous work is performed relatively rarely, although it almost invariably appears in complete recordings of the preludes. It might be worth noting that this work was a obligatory composition during the Fifth International Chopin Competition in Warsaw in 1955.

A Comedic Ballet With Legs
Wall Street Journal – USA

WSJ critic marvels at the staying power of Jerome Robbins’ Chopinistic comedic creation….

“Death,” one showbiz quip has it, “is easy; comedy is hard.” However savvy Jerome Robbins might have been in the mid-1950s as a still-budding master of both musical-theater dances and of classical ballet, he could hardly have predicted the staying power of “The Concert,” the comedic ballet he created to Chopin in 1956 and called “A Charade in One Act” and subtitled “The Perils of Everybody.”

Once his hilarious take on would-be concertgoers hit its stride with a 1971 restaging for his home-base company, the New York City Ballet, “The Concert” showed itself to be a deathless ballet comedy. In recent years, over a dozen ballet companies nationally and internationally, including one in Perm, Russia, have eagerly performed the work….

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Google Blogs Alert for: chopin

Robbins & Chopin at NYC Ballet
By oberon481

Dance-focused blogger’s taken on the Chopin/Robbins night at the NYC Ballet:

I’m not sure an all-Chopin evening is a great idea; surely the most effective programmes are those that offer musical contrasts. But THE CONCERT was fun tonight with Sterling Hyltin showing a nice flair for comedy (and dancing very well) and several amusing character players including Andrew Veyette’s henpecked, vengeful husband and Gwyneth Muller’s priceless wife with her droll efforts to maintain a sense of decorum.

Oberon’s Grove – http://oberon481.typepad.com/oberons_grove/

Chopin in the Newsgroups:

Kobrins 2005 Chopin Preludes

From the rec.music.classical newsgroup, a discussion on the merits of Alexander Kobrin’s Chopin interpretations…

Sure emphasizes the dark side, but very effective,original conceptions
seemingly not just for effect. He seems to empathize better with this more complex,subtle music than with the more
extroverted, emotional Rachmaninoff Etudes,IMHO. But this is
2005……

newsgroups.derkeiler.com: rec.music.c… – http://newsgroups.derkeiler.com/Archive/Rec/rec.music.classical.recordings

Robbins’s Definitive Chopin at the NYC Ballet
By nahnopenotquite

The Jerome Robbins Celebration for the 2008 spring season at the New York City Ballet is on now. I saw a program last night called Definitive Chopin that consisted of three pieces set to the music of, uh, Frederic Chopin (who else?).

It is hard to me to overstate how much I loved this performance. Dance is the highest expression of human physicality, the absolute apotheosis of human grace and beauty. You can see why men were always falling in love with prima ballerinas in 19th century novels. Ballet is pure elevation of the female form, so feminine, so seductive, so… The dance exults in the human body, and the dancers perform with such strength and skill that I left the theater amazed and elated. I kid you not. It was genuinely sublime.

Nah, Nope, Not Quite – http://nahnopenotquite.wordpress.com

Chopin Videos:

Prelude in C Minor, Frédéric Chopin
By Hari Ram Narayanan(Hari Ram Narayanan)

From a blog called “Chronicle of a Student Pianist…”

Frédéric Chopin referred to as “the poet of the piano”, is a polish composer. He composed almost exclusively for the piano. This piece is from his set of 24 preludes, each of which is composed in a different key. …

The Chronicles of a Student Pianist – http://thechroniclesofastudentpianist.blogspot.com/

Must male pianists be pin-ups?
guardian.co.uk – UK

Provocative column from Guardian blogger about “making glamourpusses out of pianists…” The readers think it’s more of a generation gap…

In the crisis-laden economy of classical music concerts, pianists today are often marketed as “hunka hunka burnin’ loves,” however inappropriately. A few years ago, I interviewed the talented, poetic young Chinese pianist Yundi Li in his New York manager’s office. Then in his early 20s, gawky and skinny, with tousled hair under a baseball cap, Yundi looked like the provincial Chinese youth he was. I was amazed to see how his recording company packaged his remarkable CDs of Chopin and Liszt, adding heavy makeup and swooning poses for an androgynous look. Yundi Li’s artistry was the same, but he became a different artist to look at…..

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Piano Lessons
Voice of San Diego – San Diego,CA,USA

Review of the San Diego premiere of “Beethoven As I Knew Him,” the latest installment in Hershey Felder’s trilogy of composer portraits….

First, Hershey Felder presented his fantastic one-man show, “George Gershwin Alone,” and urged theater-goers to join in on a sing-along of Gershwin hits. It was like drawing flies to honey; the enthusiastic Felder inspired gleeful audience members young and old to sing their hearts out. It was a sight (and sound) to behold.

Then came Felder’s portrayal of the emotionally intense Fredéric Chopin which gave audiences a peek into the cultural sophistication of the 19th century Parisian salon.

Now, the Old Globe presents the final installation (and world premiere) of Hershey Felder’s “Composer Sonata” trilogy of one-man performances based on famous composers’ lives with “Beethoven, As I Knew Him.” [...]

A natural and engrossing storyteller, Felder was at his best during “Beethoven” at the piano bench. Using discourse and music, Felder took the audience through pieces like Beethoven’s Fifth symphony, expounding on the famous fate-at-the-door theme. The “Moonlight” sonata rendering was exquisite. Throughout the night, Felder used anecdotes and visuals (conducting to the night sky of stars!) to enhance the overall musical performance.

Though starker and narrated at a more measured pace than both “Gershwin” and “Chopin,” “Beethoven, As I Knew Him” offers a poignant introspection into the austere composer’s beloved music….

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Prometheus celebrates a distinctive vision
Boston Globe – United States

20th-anniversary production by the Promotheus Dance Company of Boston gets high marks for everything but a Chopin-based performance…

The world premiere on the program, “Lignage,” seems disappointingly tame in comparison. A work for eight women set to a series of Chopin preludes, it contrasts slow floor work with flurries of sweeping movement – swirling turns with arms outstretched, legs carving great arcs. The women roll, cradle one another, then rise in rushes about the stage. There are a lot of stops and starts, and it has the crowded, slightly aimless feel of a work created to showcase young dancers.

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A Bay Area reviewer isn’t quite ready to hand the Chopin crown to the hot young Polish pianist….

His performance May 4 at Le Petit Trianon in San Jose, which concluded with the Preludes, the full two dozen, was very, very good: Blechacz has an awesome command of the keyboard, plays with a stunning ease.

But he also seems to realize – I’m projecting here – that he needs to transcend his mechanics, to plumb the depths. So, at least on Sunday, amid the stream of jaw-dropping technique, he kept making these stabs at introspection. They didn’t exactly seem premeditated; in fact, they were charming. But they didn’t reach their marks.

He needs seasoning, in other words. And it will be interesting to follow him the next few years, to see where his huge gifts and his intuition lead him. [...]

After intermission came Chopin’s Preludes, exquisite and familiar.

In the first dozen, comprising Book I, Blechacz didn’t get past what we already know about them. For instance, No. 4, the famous E minor “Largo,” was all cliche: earnest melancholy.

But before beginning Book II, he drew out a handkerchief and wiped off the keys. It wasn’t meant as a symbolic gesture, yet, from that point on, his performance gained traction: pointillist bursts in No. 18, the F minor; anvil chords and brokenhearted lyricism in No. 20, the C minor; scary agitation in No. 22, the G minor.

No. 24 in D minor, the closer, ran out of drama; Blechacz seemed tired. But he recovered for the last encore, Moszkowski’s “La Jongleuse” (“The Lady Juggler”), a crazily difficult piece through which he flew with the greatest of ease. The amazing young man may as well have been pulling taffy.

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Magnetic Poles
guardian.co.uk – UK

Another glowing review for a journey through modern Poland by Australian author Michael Moran, who “had no links with Poland, other than a death bed pledge to his uncle to try to understand the patriotic roots of Chopin’s music.”

When Moran escapes the crumbling school, the book is lifted on to another plane. By following the course of the Vistula – one of the last great natural rivers in Europe – and then criss-crossing the country during the first international car rally in generations, he begins to fill the absences in our knowledge. On the road he relates – for example — the history of Partition, when thousands of intellectuals were forced to walk to Siberia – an 18-month journey – where they were chained to wheelbarrows night and day and worked to death. He considers our debt to the 8,500 Polish airmen whose élan and tactics helped to win the Battle of Britain. He details the iniquity of the Katyn massacre and betrayal of the Warsaw Uprising. He celebrates Chopin and the “frisson of close Polish dancing”. His breadth of knowledge is profound, his views opinionated, his writing passionate and heart-felt. The result is the best contemporary travel book on Poland, reminiscent in its finest moments of Patrick Leigh Fermor’s masterful Time of Gifts

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Gilmore Festival performer Stephen Hough masterfully executes …
Kalamazoo Gazette – MLive.com – Kalamazoo,MI,USA

The British pianist (recipient of a MacArthur Foundation “Genius” Grant) writes the notes, then plays the program, to memorable effect…

The printed program notes, written by Hough himself, explained the first half of the concert centered on “Variations,” the second on the Waltz. He opened with Mendelssohn’s “Variations Serieuses,” Op. 54, comprised of two dozen very different variations. Quickly evident were Hough’s incredible hands and touch. Master of pianissimo and presto, he also commanded double fortes and andante passages; meanwhile his octave runs were unfailingly prodigious. [...]

Wed to his sensitive insights was extraordinary keyboard technique, evidenced further in the remainder of the program featuring Weber, Saint-Saens, Chabrier, Debussy and, fortunately for all, Chopin and Liszt.

Two familiar Chopin Waltzes –the C-sharp Minor, Op. 64, No. 2, and the A-flat Major, Op. 34, No. 1 — were gorgeously played. Each note was given full attention, as though never heard before. In the A-flat Major waltz, Hough showed uncanny ability to sound different melodic lines, played by a single hand. The effect was astonishing.

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Recital shows pianist Ohlsson at top of his game
Akron Beacon Journal – Akron,OH,USA

Whenever Garrick Ohlsson plays, Chopin is never very far away. First line says it all: “Garrick Ohlsson makes a virtue of middle age.”

Continuing in the key of C-sharp minor, Ohlsson knocked out a thrillingly fast and accurate version of the Chopin Etude Op. 10, No. 4. It was a wild ride that could only make you smile.

”One more?” Ohlsson silently mouthed to someone at the front of the audience, grinning as he asked. He proceeded with the Chopin Waltz in C-sharp minor, Op. 64, No. 2. Here, he dazzled with the delicacy and lightness of his playing.

Oh, yes, there was more before the encores. [...]

Finishing the first half with Chopin’s Sonata No. 3, Op. 58 was a move well calculated to get everyone buzzing with oohs and aahs. This was not the Chopin of a delicate aesthete but of a full-blooded romantic, with jaw-dropping fast runs and a galloping rhythmic drive in the finale.

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Ohlsson’s performance (above) also inspires a video posting on the blog below:

Chopin Prelude Op 45 Prelude No.16 Op.25 Garrick Ohlsson
By Cheryl and Janet Snell(Cheryl and Janet Snell)

Janet took our mom to see this pianist last night. He played three encores after a finger-crunching program. The Chopin was a sonata, not this Prelude, but you get the idea.
Scattered Light – http://snellsisters.blogspot.com/

Chopin News, Reviews, and Previews:

New Recordings of Legendary Pianist
New York Times – United States

This Tuesday privately made recordings of the American pianist William Kapell’s last concerts will finally be available. Sony/BMG is releasing this two-disc set, which has works by Chopin, Rachmaninoff, Bach, Mozart, Mussorgsky, Debussy and Prokofiev. Kapell was one of the great pianists of the mid-20th century when he died at 31 in a plane crash in 1953 while on his way home from a concert tour in Australia. A music lover in Melbourne had recorded radio broadcasts of several of his concerts on acetate discs, some of which made their way in 2004 through an intermediary to Kapell’s widow

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The passionate and powerful piano of Mihaela Ursuleasa
Minnesota Public Radio – Saint Paul,MN,USA

The Romanian pianists visits the studios of Minnesota Public Radio in advance of her recital…hear the story here:

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Dancers celebrate Polish culture, constitution
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review – Pittsburgh,PA,USA

A Steeltown celebration in Heinz Hall of Polish Constitution Day (May 3, 1791)

The music of Poland’s greatest composer, Frederic Chopin, will figure prominently, of course, including an orchestration of his famous “Military Polonaise.” And Migala says the traditional song “May Third” that will be sung has recently been authenticated as by Chopin.

Sunday’s concert also is a celebration of 400 years of Poles in America, dating back to 1608 at the Jamestown settlement in Virginia. Migala acknowledges that their names “have been lost in history but they set up the first factories in America, which made pitch and tar that were useful for trading.”

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Chopin, Preludes Op. 28 and Op. 45, with Three “New” Etudes and two works by Mompou. Alexandre Tharaud (Harmonia Mundi).
The Capital Times – Madison,WI,USA

Review of Alexandre Tharaud’s new Chopin/Mompou disc on Harmonia Mundi…

Speaking of Tharaud, he has just released a volume with the cycle of Chopin preludes as a follow up to his highly acclaimed CD of Chopin waltzes. Once again, Tharaud is well served by his gift as an interpreter of baroque music (J.S. Bach, Couperin and Rameau) on the modern piano. Chopin always had great baroque and classical models in mind, which is why his Romanticism is tempered and moderated compared to, say, Schumann’s….

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When Fame Can’t Cross the Atlantic
New York Times – United States

Fascinating story (and review) of Russian pianist Grigory Sokolov, lionized in Europe; barely known in America….

Classical music is supposedly universal. Language may still be a cultural barrier for writers and actors. Even visual artists, depending on the subjects they choose, won’t necessarily translate abroad.

That Mr. Sokolov, whose talent is beyond dispute, disproves this notion should remind us not only of our persistent parochialism but also of our delusions about technology. The Web, on which he can be found on YouTube, giving astonishing performances, clearly doesn’t substitute for hearing him live. Neither do discs, which, as a perfectionist, he stopped issuing in 1995 (this partly explains his American situation), although years ago Mr. Sokolov’s recordings sent me hunting for a chance to hear him in person. On one of those discs he played Chopin’s 24 Preludes with great sensitivity. He played them again the other night. It was, like all concerts likely to stay in the mind forever, nothing that could ever be captured digitally.

He gives about 60 solo recitals a year, so his manager told me; no chamber or orchestral music at the moment. He was born in Leningrad and won the Tchaikovsky Competition in 1966, at 16. Emil Gilels headed the jury. For a while Sol Hurok promoted him.

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Zimerman’s ovation in Rome
Thenews.pl – Warsaw,Poland

Returning to Rome, Krystian Zimerman surprises with a switch to Chopin…

The second part was taken up by an all-Chopin programme, instead of earlier-announced Brahms and Szymanowski.

The recital was Zimerman’s first appearance in Rome after a lapse of ten years. Some Poles in the audience remembered Zimerman’s concert and meeting with Pope John Paul II in the Vatican on Christmas Eve in 1980.

Fifty two year-old Krystian Zimerman is the winner of the Chopin International Piano Competition in Warsaw in 1975. (mk)

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Yundi Li: Prokofiev/Ravel
Times Online – UK

Review (mostly positive) of Yundi Li’s attempt to break out of his Chopin sterotype, along with the inevitable Lang Lang comparisions….

There comes a time in any young piano virtuoso’s life when the need mounts for breaking out of the core 19th-century repertoire into the wide, wild world beyond. You can’t always be wrapped around Chopin and Liszt. Alongside oriental trinkets, that smiling Chinese onslaught Lang Lang has become an improbable concert interpreter of the thickets of notes in Tippett’s Piano Concerto. For his second concerto CD, Yundi Li, Lang Lang’s compatriot (born the same year, too, 1982), has been more cautious. He has chosen Prokofiev No 2, in a Berlin live performance from May. [...]

The more Lang Lang’s performances drift into candelabra rhetoric – the Liberace style of playing – the greater the attraction of Yundi Li’s sobriety. Maybe this Prokofiev could be more tigerish, yet Yundi’s dizz dexterity and ability to shade colours within the composer’s dark and narrow band gave sufficient pleasure to me. To the Berlin audience also: the performance concludes with their roars of applause.

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href=”http://www.youtube.com/v/0X-PRpqj7N4&hl=en”>

VideoSong 4 – Radiohead/Chopin Matchup

See it to believe it….

1. What you see is what you hear (no lip-syncing for instruments or voice).2. If you hear it, at some point you see it (no hidden sounds).Radiohead’s Exit Music for a Film matched with a prelude by Chopin, Op. 28, no. …
Digg / upcoming – http://digg.com/

Chopin in the FloralSphere:

CHOPIN-ESQUE?
By Daniel Mount(Daniel Mount)

Did you know that there was a Chopin tulip?

This kaufmaniana tuilp “Chopin” is short but bold, as yellow as a yield sign with a flaming pointed petal form.
– http://danielmount.blogspot.com/

New Chopin Downloads:

Chopin Files on AmieStreet.com
By ArtMusicReview4818
Pianist hugh sung has just made his first set of solo keyboard compositions by Frederic chopin available for purchase on Amie Street. hugh sung’s renditions of the Waltz in A-flat major, Op. 69 No. 1, the Waltz in C-sharp minor, Op. …
Art Music Review – http://ArtMusicReview4818.rticlz.com

Dyngus Day to proclaim Polish pride
Buffalo News – NY, United States

Today we tip our hat to the venerable Chopin Singing Society, proud keepers of the Dyngus Day flame in Western New York…

For the clueless, Dyngus Day is a Polish-American tradition marking the end of Lent, the 40- day period of prayer and self-denial preceding Christianity’s joyous celebration of Easter. The unofficial holiday — typically observed with pussy willows and squirt guns — has been observed in Buffalo since the first Polish immigrants arrived in the 1870s.

However, after the Chopin Singing Society held the first modern celebration on Kosciusko Street in 1961, Dyngus Day began to outgrow its ethnic and geographic confines. It is now celebrated by Poles and non- Poles throughout Buffalo and Western New York.

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Preparing for a party
Cheektowaga Times – NY, USA

More on Dyngus Day…

Judge Ann Mikoll of the Chopin Singing Society agrees, noting that Dyngus Day is not a religious holiday.

“It’s a social get-together that’s based on a long-standing tradition over the centuries,” Mikoll added.

The day has become so popular in the area that it inspired Jerry Darlak and the Buffalo Touch to record a song, “Everybody’s Polish on Dyngus Day,” that immediately became a local hit. One of the lead singers for the Touch, Ray Barsukiewicz, is credited with penning the lyrics.

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Other Chopin News, Reviews, and Previews:

Dance Review: Complexions Contemporary Ballet
Jerusalem Post – Israel

Another modern ballet work set to the timeless music of Chopin, (though with yet another spelling of his first name!) on tour in Israel:

“Dear Fredric,” which opened the evening, is perhaps a more ambitious work, set to music by Chopin. The strong and highly physical troop was challenged in this piece, which required stamina and rapid, powerful movements. With this athletic sprint approach, though, too little attention was dedicated to Chopin’s spirit. It didn’t take long before the congested dance phrases became tedious.

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Listening Post: Music from ‘Heroes,’ Switches, Mozart, Koz and more
Buffalo News – NY, United States

A Dyngus Day review of Alexander Tharaud’s new Chopin/Mompou CD:

Chopin and Mompou, “Preludes and Etudes,” Alexandre Tharaud, piano (Harmonia Mundi). I like the thought that Tharaud gives to his music. He wants to perform Chopin’s 24 Preludes without a pause, so I’m guessing he recorded them that way — and you have to respect any pianist who doesn’t take advantage of modern technology to edit everything to death. Tharaud’s strength at the piano is his crisp, controlled tone. He can get wild, and sometimes his herky-jerky tempos can throw off the character of some of the more delicate pieces — the second of Chopin’s “Trois Nouvelles Etudes,” for instance. But he boldly brings out inner voices and draws your attention, gently, to harmonies you may have not noticed before. The approach gives poetry to the more harmonically challenging Mompou. _★★★ (M.K.G.)

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Chopin Videos:

Chopin Prelude e-minor
By Admin

Chopin on a dark Polish road…

… src=”http://img.youtube.com/vi/atW2XWdR2b8/2.jpg” width=”320″ height=”240″ border=”1″ />Chopin Prelude e-minor

Chopin News, Reviews, and Previews:

Pianist’s intense preparation and talent have brought him global …
Schenectady Gazette – Schenectady,NY,USA

Another preview for the current recital tour of 2000 Chopin Competition winner Yundi Li, who’ll play Sunday March 16th at the acoustically-rich Troy (NY) Savings Bank Music Hall. In this installment, we learn:

His role models for pianists were Maurizio Pollini of Italy and Krystian Zimerman of Poland, both of them previous winners of the Chopin competition who had gone on to major careers.

Since his incredible win at the 2000 International Chopin Competition at age 18 when he was the first competitor to take home a gold medal in 15 years and …
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Unremarkable night salvaged by Israeli’s rendition of Schubert
Ha’aretz – Tel Aviv,Israel

Meanwhile, at the Artur Rubinstein Piano Competition in Tel Aviv, the local critic is more impressed by an old film of the master in action than any of the flesh-and-blood contestants….

The second contestant, Rem Urasin of Moscow, strived to project an especially “deep” message, yet the result was boredom. The mazurkas of Chopin proved heavy and artificial, the antithesis of the Rubinstein approach, of which I was reminded while in the vestibule of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art. The museum was screening footage of Rubinstein leading a class in 1979 at the “Mishkenot Sha’ananim” in Jerusalem. It is worthwhile to stop and observe the old craftsman in action, demanding “simplicity” and emphasizing articulative rendition that needed to stem from genuine, internal emotion. For him and for musicians that managed to connect with him, such comprehensive instructions contained meaning.

The mazurkas of Chopin proved heavy and artificial, the antithesis of the Rubinstein approach, of which I was reminded while in the vestibule of the Tel …
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Konstantin Igumnov = CHOPIN: Mazurka No. 33 in B Major, Op. 56, No …
Audiophile Audition – USA

Another reissue review:

Another in the series The Russian Piano Tradition, this installment celebrates the artistry of Konstantin Nikolayevich Igumnov (1873-1948)–Moscow Conservatory teacher of notables Jakob Flier, Lev Oborin, and Bella Davidovich–with inscriptions Igumnov made 1935-1947 in fair to moderately passable sound. ….Chopin’s B Major Mazurka, which despite the tinny sound that haunts all Soviet inscriptions, reveals a fine sense of legato and good inner pulsation.

Igumnov claimed supremacy in the romantic repertory, particularly in the music of Chopin, Schumann, Scriabin, Rachmaninov, and Tchaikovsky. …
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Chopin in the Blogosphere:

Chord Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes
Idolator – New York,NY,USA

More about musicologist Dmitri Tyomoczko’s intriguing video linking math, chords, Chopin, and spatial relationships…..and just how is it that scientists keep linking Chopin and Deep Purple?

There, he shows a Chopin chord progression represented as movement around a circle, and since a 12-point circle is a clock, it’s easy to follow. …
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CHOPIN-WALTZ

A blogger’s selection of favorite Chopin waltzes on YouTube…

Sergio Fiorentino plays Chopin Waltz Op 18 (GRAND WALTZ)–LEARN http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXqfMj7xj5M Yundi Li plays Chopin Nocturne Op. 9 No. 2 –LEARN http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvxS_bJ0yOU Horowitz plays Chopin Ballade 1 …
NONIK’S SITE – http://ininonik.multiply.com/

Loving Coq – Rooster – Ballet Review
By Vance(Vance)

A Toronto blogger weighs in on the National Ballet of Canada’s “32″ [sic] Preludes” – apparently too dazzled by the outfits to note that there are actually only 24 of ‘em….

And then there’s the first piece, 32 Preludes by Chopin that is weird and wonderful and modern and abstract and very very cool. Did I mention everyone is in tights? Tights that are transparent and only strategically covered by small …
Tapeworthy – http://tapeworthy.blogspot.com/

Cellist Oh Ah-mi’s Courageous Crossover
Korea Times – South Korea

The world’s first self-described “crossover cellist,” breaks conventions by adding dance moves to the still-standing cello performance. “I am inspired by Vanessa Mae’s passionate playing and Beyonce’s strong stage presence” she says…

`It’s really demanding, so I just have to practice that much more,” she said. Though not a trained dancer, Oh enjoys dancing and worked with a choreographer to create moves. In her first showcase performance at Seongnam Art Center tonight, her cello will be her dance partner as she waltzes to “Chopin’s Party of Dupin,” which was inspired by the Waltze (Op. 64 No. 2).`\

Two were inspired by well-known Chopin and Dvorak music. “(The composer and I) discussed our work a lot. I wanted to reinterpret the music and make them …
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Review: Traces – Les 7 Doigts de la Main
The Dominion Post – Wellington,New Zealand

Chopin cheek-by-jowl with Chinese acrobats and skateboarders….

There’s endearing Chopin played live on a wonky piano, and a girl made of rubber who reads on (and through, over, under, and off) an even wonkier armchair. …
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Chopin in the Blogosphere:

The Geometry Of Music
Partyvibes – Netherlands

From a Dutch blog: Chopin the cubist’s delight, via Princeton professor Dmitri Tymoczko:

Tymoczko looked at the piece and watched the composition’s motion through his geometrical space, he saw that Chopin was moving in a systematic way among the different layers of the four-dimensional cubes. “It’s almost as if he’s an improviser with a set of rules and set of constraints,” Tymoczko says.

Music theorists have long found Chopin’s E minor prelude puzzling. , Although the chord progressions sound smooth to the ear, they don’t quite follow the …
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Rajka – Group 3 – Tiny Murders
By seaglassgirl

To what nationality does Chopin truly belong? From an online writing workshop….

I am back in my chair, with the half-cup of Cappuccino. I put my feet up and listen, again, to Chopin. I wonder: to whom does he belong? To everyone, to no one. Another soul who transcends us all and makes us whole. Content, I listen.
Opening the Circle – http://writingfromtheheart.wordpress.com

Chopin News, Reviews, and Previews:

National Ballet’s versatility shines in triumphant trio
Globe and Mail – Canada

RAVE review for National Ballet of Canada program that leads off with post-modern interpretation of the Chopin Preludes, courtesy of Quebecois choreographer Marie Chouinard:

“From the get-go, Chouinard announces that hers is not a traditional interpretation of, dare I say, Chopin schlock.

Chouinard makes us listen to this well known music played by the excellent Jean-François Latour, with new ears, while lighting designer Axel Morgenthaler has ensured that the audience focuses on hands, feet or whichever part of the body Chouinard has put into play. Moments are wonderfully droll such as a particularly angst-filled prelude accompanied by a soccer ball and a pick-up game. As the piece progresses, bodies distort while limbs are angled in the most peculiar way, but always tied to the music, as if Chopin wrote disco.

The iconoclast Chouinard has deconstructed Chopin’s quintessential romantic music to create quirky dances that reflect mood, emotion and beat, …
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The National Ballet says ta-ta to tutus
Toronto Star – Ontario, Canada

Thumbs-Up, too, from the Toronto Star:

Exposing as much of their perfectly sculpted bodies as could be decently exposed, 17 dancers performed an enlarged version of Marie Chouinard’s 24 Preludes by Chopin. Enlarged, that is, by seven dancers, heightening the dynamics of a kaleidoscope of choreographic invention. The company looked about as far from white tights and tutus as it ever has.

Chouinard’s work is full of audacity and surprises – all the better to sharpen the National Ballet’s cutting edge.

It is not the songs of the Rolling Stones but 24 Preludes by Frédéric Chopin that give the National Ballet of Canada a fresh, edgy look in the mixed program …
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Chopin: Piano Concerto No. 2 in F Minor; Polonaise in A-flat Major; Artur Rubinstein, piano/Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra/witold Rowicki
Audiophile Audition – USA

Glowing review of a new reissue on the Altara label of a legendary Rubistein recording dating from 1960, at the Chopin Competition in Warsaw that marked the 150th anniversary of the composer’s birth.

Chopin’s liquid lines, proceeding by way of lithe ornaments, achieve any number of noble gestures. The middle section is all shimmering melodrama, the nervously palpitating strings supporting arioso and declamatory runs from Rubinstein’s fleet fingers. The last movement’s mazurka-laden Rondo has Rubinstein applying bold strokes, consummate acrobatics in rhythm and dynamic nuance, the Warsaw Philharmonic in splendid, shared leaps and somersaults.

The immediacy of Rubinstein’s playing in the opening Chopin Concerto is its utter spontaneity and poetic breadth. At 73, Rubinstein had learned to enjoy …
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Chopin in the Blogosphere:

Lennox Berkeley: Mazurka Op.101b
By John France(John France)

From the Land of Lost Content (“Musings on British Classical Music,”) a discovery of a Chopin-inspired Mazurka from compsoer Lennox Berkeley (pronounced “BARK-lee” in YankSpeak):

However Berkeley had already nodded to Chopin with a set of Three Mazurkas written in 1949 to celebrate the Chopin death centenary. And of course Chopin was an influence on much of Berkeley’s more ‘advanced’ piano music too. …
The Land of Lost Content – http://landofllostcontent.blogspot.com/

Chopin Downloads of Dubious Legality

Hans Wurman – 1970 – Chopin a la Moog
By stigma2(stigma2)

Noted without comment….

51,54 MB.
stigma rest room – http://stigmarestroom.blogspot.com/

Chopin News, Previews, Rants, and Reviews:

Live: Lang Lang

Yesterday we brought you two views of Yundi Li; today it’s the “other” superstar Chinese pianist’s turn. Mark Swed of the LA Times is both impressed and appalled:

Tuesday night, he [Lang Lang] returned to Walt Disney Concert Hall for a recital. The place was, inevitably, packed. The audience was antsy, wanting fireworks, and Lang Lang eventually delivered. First, though, he had to prove he was a poet.

“He is a poet. But he is an immature poet with a nuclear arsenal, and that makes him a very dangerous poet. The nuclear part of the weaponry is a killer technique. The threat is in the delivery system. He has the charisma to hold an audience in his power. Responsibility, though, is another matter….

“Lang Lang has inherited Liberace’s curse. Once the audience knows what he can do, he must give it what it wants. And each time, he must outdo himself. In the single encore, Chopin’s Etude, Opus 10, No. 3, he outdid himself….

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Flashy pianist Lang startlingly graceful in Houston show

The headlines says it all…Houston Chronicle reviewer Everett Evans on the hand is pleasantly surprised…

“Lang Lang is renowned for flash as well as artistry — and he didn’t disappoint fans on either count in his performance of Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 2 Thursday night with the Houston Symphony. Yet the predominant quality that distinguished his performance was grace.

“The famous mannerisms, swaying moves and transported expressions — symbols of the artist not only performing but feeling the music — were present, but less frequent and more subdued than in some of his past performances. But then Chopin is not Beethoven nor Rachmaninoff and this work calls for a more quicksilver approach, more moments of delicacy and fewer of bravado.”

Houston Chronicle – United States
By EVERETT EVANS Lang Lang is renowned for flash as well as artistry — and he didn’t disappoint fans on either count in his performance of Chopin’s Piano …
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Renowned pianist next door

A preview of a Baltimore-area recital by Korean-turned-Columbia, MD resident Eun Joo Chung, which includes with a bravura piece of Chopiniana:

Chopin paired the serenely rippling Andante spianato with its extroverted and rousing opposite, the Grande Polonaise Brillante in E flat major, which was originally written for piano and orchestra..

While Sunday’s program certainly requires virtuosity, Chung hopes that the audience will take away something more. “If the performer is able to invite me into the music, I feel that it is a very intimate conversation taking place as opposed to a show or a display,” she says.

Baltimore Sun – United States
With the exception of the Chopin, the music on the program is based on variation; a short musical phrase is repeated and developed, becoming more intricate …
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Chopin: Preludes; etc, Alexandre Tharaud

A more tepid review of the new Harmonia Mundi CD from the UK Guardian. Critic Andrew Clements likes the Chopin all right, but is less taken by the pairings…

He follows the Op 28 set of the 24 Preludes with a curious little sequence that interleaves more of Chopin’s miniatures, including the three posthumous studies and the much more substantial C sharp minor Prelude Op 45, with three pieces by Frederic Mompou. Tharaud describes the Mompou as “a more recent, more intimate echo of the Chopin” and plays it with the same care and sensitivity he lavishes on the more famous works, without ever disguising the fact that it has very little real musical substance.

Guardian – UK
Though his repertory ranges from Couperin right up to Kagel, Chopin seems to be a speciality of Tharaud’s. This disc of the Preludes follows an earlier one …
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CHOPIN: Piano Concerto No. 1 in E Minor, Op. 11; Piano Concerto No 2…

Nice review of Music & Arts reissue of pianist Paul Badura-Skoda’s recording of the two piano concertos with Artur Rodzinski and the Vienna State Opera Orchestra:

“Badura-Skoda passes off Chopin’s roulades and tricky accents in the manner of an intimate series of etudes, here much closer to the Chopin who dazzled George Sand. Rarely does Badura-Skoda take a repeat in the same manner, always shading the rhythm or the harmony with subtle touches of diaphanous color. Formidable!”

Audiophile Audition – USA

The Viennese tradition in Badura-Skoda pays elegant stylistic homage to Chopin, though we could argue that the performances are more of Hummel than the …
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Popcorn Panel: The Other Boleyn Girl

A trio of Canadian film critics nominate historical films they like a lot better than the current Portman/ScarJo bodice-ripper…”Impromptu” gets the nod from one…. “an emo late-80s movie about the love affair between Chopin and George Sand. Hugh Grant is appropriately floppy-haired as Chopin, and Judy David is an extremely overwrought George Sand. And Bernadette Peters and Mandy Patinkin are in it for no apparent reason.”

National Post – Toronto,Ontario,Canada

Almost as much as I loved Impromptu, an emo late-80s movie about the love affair between Chopin and George Sand. Hugh Grant is appropriately floppy-haired …
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