Forty piano compositions Chopin

Bostov

FORTY PIANO COMPOSITIONS

FREDERIC CHOPIN EEMTED BY

JAMES HUNEKER

OLIVER DITSON

COMPANY

FORTY PIANO COMPOSITIONS BY FREDERIC CHOPIN

FORTY PIANO COMPOSITIONS

FREDERIC CHOPIN EDITED BY

JAMES HUNEKER Mi )

fi>3

OLIVER DITSON COMPANY THEODORE PRESSER

CO., Distributors,

1712

CHESTNUT ST., PHILADELPHIA

COPYRIGHT,

1903,

BY OLIVER DITSON COMPANV

\lt

CONTENTS WALTZ

PRELUDE in

C. Op. 28, No.

in

G. Op. 28, No. 3 E Minor. Op. 28, No. 4 B Minor. Op. 28, No. 6 Dk Op. 28, No. 15. (The Raindrop)

in in in

MAZURKA in

in

Bk Op.

B> Minor. Op.

Dk

in

A

Op.

in

24,

No. 4

Op. Op.

1

io.

25,

No. No.

5. 1.

(The Black Keys) (The /Eolian Harp)

in

Minor. Op. 25, No. 7 Gk Op. 25, No. 9. (The Butterfly)

in

D> Eb.

Op. Op. Op.

in

Dk

in

B

in

G

in

G. Op.

{Grande Vahe Brillante) 1.

{Vahe Brillante)

Minor. Op. 34, No. 2 Op. 42. {Grande Vahe)

Ak Dk

Op.

64, No.

1

Minor. Op. 64, No. 2

75

9,

Minor. Op. 26, No.

in Cft in

A

Major. Op. 40, No.

IMPROMPTU in

A?

92 97 105 115

120

1.

1

{Polonaise Militaire)

124 128

I

Major. Op. 29

in Cft

133

in At*

in Bl?

27,

No. 2

37, No. 2

III

Major, Op. 47

148

II

Minor. Op. 31

159

BERCEUSE

No. 2

Major. Op. 32, No. Minor. Op. 37, No.

Minor. Op. 66. (Posthumous)

BALLADE

No. 2

15,

'n

Db

Major. Op. 57

175

1

1

.

JU//

109

Ak Op. 64, No. 3 E Minor. (Posthumous)

SCHERZO

NOCTURNE in

in

18.

34, No.

FANTAISIE-IMPROMPTU

in Cft

in Fft.

in

Op. Op.

POLONAISE

30,

Minor, Op._68, N©r~2

Gk Ak

A

in

in

STUDY in

in

1

No. 3 in Gft Minor. Op. 33, No. iu_C. Op. 33, No. 3 in B Minor. Op. 33, No. 4 in Ak Op. 50, No. 2 in

Ek Ak

in Cft

No.

7,

in

in

i

FUNERAL MARCH

{Marche Funehre)

from the Sonata. Op. 35, No. 2

181

/'

FREDERIC FRANCOIS CHOPIN (1809-1849)

FREDERIC CHOPIN Francois FREDERIC composer of greatest

is

the

music for the

had been said be-

pianoforte. All that fore

Chopin

or Beethoven, seems, after listening to Chopin,

language foreign to the in-

When he speaks, it is the speech of whom this combination of wood, wire,

strument. for

role

—

is

is

its

Plastic, entirely

The

poetry inherent in

preme

him

of such rare distinction as to give

a niche in the

Pantheon of

illustrious

com-

the case with his friend Franz Liszt,

Chopin's

skill

shadowed

his

marvellously,

it

perhaps his music

under other

pianist

music. This bewildered critics

often failed to dis-

tests

will

But

fingers.

it

did,

and

this

is

one

of its universality; Liszt, Rubinstein,

Tausig, JosefFy, Pachmann, Paderewski, and all

played and play Chopin beauti-

while sects of warring

amateurs, cry "this

critics,

wrangling

not so"; and yet no one may claim the unique Chopin so," or "that

is

is

tradition for the very simple reason that

elusive quality exists. tion.

To

thing.

it

structure,

Chopin with burly

attack

is

in its

fingers or

aroma of

to destroy the

his measures.

As

in the tenuity

of his musical textures,

loftiness

even

apart, a consecrated

a poet he ranks with Shelley

of his

lyric flights;

in the su-

and he

is

twain with Keats in the richness of his harmonic coloring, in the

deep-hued humanity of his mewe think of him first

as a poet.

Hummel nor the elegant rhetoric of Kalkbrenner.

own

contemporaries: the

fully,

its

technical figuration, sets

not sound as beautiful

He was a wonderful

life.

his

tinguish between his two gifts. If he played so

Rosenthal

loveliness, his

was argued, not without justice,

genuine merits as a composer dur-

and he played

of the

its

Chopin took up the threads of Haydn, and Philipp Emanuel Bach. He found piano music given over to the empty formalism of Hummei or to the brilliant and inutile passage work of Kalkbrenner. By nature an aristocrat, the young Pole did not disdain the graceful framework of

over-

as a pianoforte virtuoso

ing his too short

his

be,

lodic utterances. Therefore

posers.

As was

it

eager votaries.

dream-like in

poet, then the musician; and his achievements as musician are

will

music yields only to the embrace of the poet. It may be wooed but never taken by assault.

sledge-hammer wrists

—

never

one right way to interpret Chopin.

and ivory is a human harp a harp from which the most exquisite, sombre, tragic poetry is plucked. This Pole is rightfully named the poet of the keyboard a title that has been often debased by claims of lesser men. He is first the iron

And

great art and great art always plays the

of the Sphinx to

There

him by the masters, Bach, Mozart,

as if w-itten in a

one

has never been unriddled. for his

There

is

no such

no Chopin

tradi-

There never was one, even when Chopin

lived, for he played his

compositions no two days,

As

a musician

that skein which antedates Mozart,

But he had something new

He was a native

not.

him was mightily stirred by his nation's songs and nation's wrongs. He found near at hand simple dance forms and straightway, filled with eloquent music, idealized them

;

yet they lost not

wood-note wild. A sworn devotion to Bach and Mozart, he

their native flavor, their classicist in his is

still

the prince of the Romantics; a severe

formalist,

though

his

forms were not those of

fugue or sonata, he nevertheless set beating the pulse of

mysterious, poetic charm of his music;

kling mazurkas.

secret

had

in

or ways, alike. This constitutes the evanescent, its

to say; they

of old Sarmatia and the patriot

Europe with his gay valses and sparAt his cradle had stood the Angel

FREDERIC CHOPIN

x

No one ever heard

men were foredoomed

Chopin laugh, His smile, rare and charming, was like that of his American brother-poet, Edgar Allan Poe. Both of Melancholy.

to

unhappiness; both

dis-

dained mediocrity and therefore supped their

fill

of misery.

II

Chopin was born in Zelazowa-Wola, six miles from Warsaw, Poland, March i, 1809. He died in Paris October 17, 1849. But in those brief forty years, in the interval, as Walter Pater has he lived an existence devoted to

it,

burned away

literally

his frai! frame.

art, a lite that

By no means

the delicate, effeminate child of the sentimental

biographer, the

much by

If petted

managed

little

Frederic was never robust. his

mother and

sisters,

to enjoy himself in a manlier

he

way with

boyish comrades, the pupil's of his father's

his

This father was

school.

a

Frenchman,

trans-

planted from Nancv, and probably of Polish ori-

mother, Justina Krzyzanowska,

gin. Frederic's

was,

it

need hardly be added, a pure Pole. For

her the youthful pianist entertained a love that

was

characteristic.

tive

of

She became the leading mo-

his life; all his actions

were governed

if

not actually by her, at least in deference to her wishes.

One

of the things he feared most after

he became a friend of the novelist, George Sand,

was

his

mother's criticism. This

later in life,

As he reverenced

his

for

many

mother, so

he reverenced his mother's sex; and while his private

life

was not conventional, he always

for-

bore from certain associations. Temperamentally the

man had no

by the world.

taste for the things

He

lic

most prized

never married; he never gath-

upon him as him almost at him no message of

ered riches; and the honors heaped

by Gyrowetz

new

collar

of the

gifts

my

at

little

good

amused himself and his companclever improvising. His father soon

early

ions with his

decided that there was a real

gift to

develop and

engaged a Bohemian named Adalbert

Zwyny

to

teach his son the rudiments of art. This instructor was a violinist as well as pianist and

Chopin

to study

compo-

Joseph Eisner, the chief influence for his musical career. Eisner was old fash-

in

He

ioned but sound.

was a severe master and

rigid in his discipline. If

way

in the

own

he gave the bov his

matter of piano-playing, he never

lowed him

al-

to relax in his study of the classics.

Chopin many times

referred with refreshing grat-

And

itude to his old master.

him he owed it would

to

the sanity and lucidity of his music;

all

have been an easy matter for the lad

mained

a

to

have

re-

improviser and rhapsodist,

brilliant

Eisner taught Chopin to cast his dreams into

a

durable mould.

Chopin's youth was spent

if

He

tainly not unpleasantly.

not happily, cer-

was

good

in fairly

health, studied diligently without too great a

upon

strain

sisters.

his nerves,

When

been once as

and doted much on

he went to Vienna

at last

far as Berlin

hold's sorrow.

He

his

— he had

— great was the house-

bravely lived

it

down, petted

though he was, and actually tempt:d the fates by appealing to the suffrages of an elect Viennese

la

Precocious musically, and sensitive as Mozart,

pub-

8 at a

sition with

audience August 11, 1829.

Chopin

1

fellow, participated in his edu-

and presently he began

cation,

played his Variations,

was a dreamer of dreams.

8

Polish aristocracy noted the

the tomb's portal, bore for

He

1

remarked naively

collar," he

The

mother.

to his

a virtuoso, the fame that greeted

joy.

in

more preoccupied with his than with his success. "Everybody

concert and was

was looking

trait, intensified

was undoubtedly the reason

of his actions.

throve so well under his tutelage that he played a piano concerto

mano" and it

might have resulted

dence

at

"La

it

ci

darem

His success

he had followed

in a

permanent

On

it

resi-

Warsaw.

to

had seen the world, had tasted of the

of knowledge, which fruit.

that occasion he

on

Vienna. But after a second concert

Chopin returned

He

1,

several improvisations.

was an unqualified one, and

up

On

Opus

his return

in his case

he

fell

was not an

promptly

in

fruit

evil

love with

,

FREDERIC CHOPIN Constantia Gladowska, and

want of decision

in declaring his visit to

dispirited,

!

Warsaw he went

concerts in

his

passion was the

Vienna Certainly he and after two very nattering

cause of his second

became

who knows but

to Breslau, Dres-

lioz

and Meyerbeer declared that he did not play that is metronomically they could

time

in

—

—

not withhold their

meed of praise. They simply

could not comprehend his use of tempo rubato a greatly misunderstood thing to-day. He was

—

den and Prague, arriving

a

summer of

supernatural and his charming spirituelle physi-

83

1

1

in Vienna during the Chopin had heard Rubini, the

.

tenor, Henriette Sontag, the soprano,

devoted

Italian singing,

to

and being

enjoyed as well as

phenomenon. Heine swore

that

Chopin was

;

ognomy and

fairy-like playing certainly aided

the illusion. Thalberg complained that his per-

art. Hummel set him wild with enthusiasm and he must have envied Thalberg,

formances lacked weight, and

then the lion pianist, for he speaks slightingly of

heavy masses of orchestral tone that our virtuosi extort from their instruments, Chopin's liquid tones and gossamer flights would possibly seem

profited by their

him

Vienna was not so pleasant

in his letters.

a

place as formerly, for his friends, fearing the revolution,

soon

Stuttgart and hearing of the capture

Warsaw by

of

the Russians, September 8,

wrote the Revolutionary Study 10,

No.

It

He

had gone to Germany and France.

left for

in

1

83

1

C minor, Opus

was October, 1831, that Chopin

first

saw

unsubstantial. But there was the poet in his work There was revealed a soul of tenderness and also

the heroic soul.

When

Eroica Polonaise he

he sang with

he dashed into his

As

of his

fadlors

in

life

Paris Chopin's nature expanded. social as well as artistic

George Sand. This was portance for him.

Schumann phrased

faint irony

Warsaw

were

the

his love

enjoyed

triumphs and he met

happening of prime im-

a

The

He

in

celebrated novelist had

an

it;

when

his capriciously

art hitherto

the pedal, and dangerous rhythmic freedom.

ances because of his nervous timidity friend Liszt

who fought

nature was too intimate

Be

delicacy of physique

may, Chopin's attachment to the fascinating woman became a part of his life. When at last they became bad friends, he drooped, with-

Yet

it

sentimental,

hecftic

ered, died. Sensitive he

months

piece.

and he

saved no money.

George Sand.

When

she failed him, he

could live no longer.

Such was the strange being who enchanted debut

at the

his

admired him,

house of Baron Rothschild

He

finally

It

was

his

the public suffocates

at

one

He labored over his

hours, days, weeks, and

He gave many lessons, but A few visits to England, a trip to

the island of Majorca in the Mediterranean Sea

with the Sand family, where he nearly perished of

hearers in the drawing-rooms of the French capi-

decided his future.

—"

dawdler.

filing for

was to a morbid degree from the care of his mother

!

musical arena and

must not be imagined that with all this and temperament he was a

compositions,

really passed

in the

strangled lions with superb effrontery. Chopin's

me," he confessed.

it

And

wonder-worker, the magician of all those spells, was constrained from public appearthis slender

mother to men of genius; that without her aid they might never have fully realized themselves.

A

one of

undreamed of, vvas being reHis was indeed a new art, with its employment of dispersed harmonies, novel use of art,

often boasted that she played the part of a step-

tal.

fiery

suggested the "cannons

vealed.

mother and Constantia Gladowska so

to that of

to the

was an eventful one for him, yet out-

wardly not rich in adventure.

this as

no doubt

this vvas

accustomed

perverse mazurkas his hearers divined that a new

two determining for his

ears,

home until the day of his death and now repose his remains. His ca-

the spot where reer there

For modern

buried in flowers" as

12.

Paris, his

the truth.

became the "rage." Liszt adored him; and while Ber-

lung trouble,and

—

this

His

his

rupture with

Madame Sand

about comprises the history of Chopin.

life is

writ large in his music.

go to understand the man.

To

it

we must

FREDERIC CHOPIN III

To make is

from Chopin's music

a viable selection

a perilous task;

it is

a question of a little taken

while great riches remain behind. Five Sonatas fairly set

before us the many-sided Beethoven,

vet a Ballade, Scherzo, Etude, Prelude, Valse,

Sonata, Polonaise,

Chopin

Impromptu

or Nocturne of

many

send us to the

will surely

neglected ones of the same

titles.

cruel, so the editor of a collection

is

other

Necessity

is

compelled

to

more extended and difficult compositions, making his choice a representative rather than a complete one. Chopin was so versatile, he sacrifice the

presented in so

many

disguises a single thought,

The present edition

that he ends by bewildering. is

therefore an attempt to present the

most favorable

in his is

And

light.

this

Opus

if

necessary, the Scherzo in

20, could havebeenincluded.

his ancient

should be repeated. ning bass figure it

revolt, the fire

The

A

and hatred of the

other two Polonaises, in

the

A

A

and

He

flat

major, the

Drum

loved the twilight more than the dawn

—

— and

in

the six Nocturnes

F

sharp

B

minor,

The

editor

abundance the later Polonaise.

sharp minor and

his martial vigor:

indeed

more celebrated one

relates

The

first

Madame

very

brilliant

Study in

D

It

is

— and faces

in

flat

a

A

in

G

its

and

flat is

study in

flat is

was the drip-drip of the

its

rain

of the dead that sent the too imagi-

native poet shivering to his piano. Probably the

in the

The

effective.

chanting

same key

iEolian

another favorite

;

is

Harp

but the one

more frequently. contrasted rhythms and legato and

eight arechosen.

epigrammatic dances

Inno

his originality as in

— they

have

been

Dances of the Soul. Variety in mood and tonality is duly considered. Thus opposed to the

Mazurka in B flat, the sad hesitancy of B flat minor proves an admirable foil. The A minor Mazurka has that morbid flavor the one in

in

monks

familiar in the concert

companion

Out of many Mazurkas

saucy

— she was absent

in

its at-

this dainty piece repays careful study.

Chopin, so

Sand, saw in a waking dream her

flat

touches. Sprightly, graceful, charming,

staccato

called the Raindrop.

it

D

deserves to be heard

justly cele-

during the progress of a storm, tropical

upon the

one

room and with

is

and the two children drowned severity

lay

all

it is

clinging double notes,

form has Chopin manifested

— some of them, not — while he

brated and

must

it

in

hidden by the graceful devices of the composer.

these

D flat

its

said to be the transcription of

called

in

The one

some bare, ruined choir. The five Studies are the more pleasing, the technical problems being

in

Polonaise.

The one

The Nocturne

charged with feeling- yet

mosphere of languorous reverie. The Nocturne G minor is very popular. The second theme

opens with the Preludes. These

Majorca.

is

he had

all

in

tone-poems were composed by

Chopin

find nearly

major with

collection

ailing at

we may

rise early

to sav in this fascinating form. in

tiny, questioning

This

type do not

his

G

major Polonaise, surnamed the Military,

quite as heroic as the

as beautiful.

all

very poetic, a companion piece for that

major, give a complete picture of Chopin's ca-

pricious melancholy

is

C

And

that there

is

minor Polonaise, Opus

2, contains in sufficient

in sentiment.

Nocturnes, chosen for their variety and

dreamers of

in

No.

very pretty

wealth of mood, give us Chopin on hissecretside.

is

26,

the run-

statement

mocking spirit, its drastic irony may be found more confined walls of the B minor Mazurka. Nor is that overwhelming Polonaise in F sharp minor here, for technically it is only flat

Prelude

G with

must not be forgotten by the student

The

within the

E

The first

in

are twenty-two other Preludes,

less

has found that the

is

The one

not be delivered sentimentally.

But its relent-

possible in the hands of a virtuoso.

abode on the island evoked the rhyth-

mic foundation of this Prelude.

composer

not to be taken in an apologetic sense. For

example,

dropping of rain through the dilapidated roof of

which betokens in

D

flat

and

a soul

weary of

life

;

but the two

A flat are excellent antidotes. The

Funeral March needs no

comment

remains mortuarv music without the Cradle Song, loveliest of

its

here. It

still

Nor does style, demand

rival.

;

:

FREDERIC CHOPIN analysis.

The two Impromptus are

trast ; the first all clarity , its outlines

the second

With

the

is

it

his

sweetness

most nature. His was a haughty if shrinking sou! and the hatred he felt for his country's oppressors

redolent of caprice and pessimism.

A flat

Ballade

we come upon

forms of the master, a form In

studiesincon-

never blurred

the larger

own.

specifically his

dramatic despair, his defiance to

fate, his

melting lyricism and his brilliant flights are

This Ballade is wonderful. fingers

felt.

It requires well-trained

and a bold heart to subdue

it.

The

stu-

dent must give especial study to pedaling and phrasing.

"The

pedal

is

the breath of the piano-

forte."

The

Polonaises have been mentioned.

The

demand no extended commentary. They range the gamut of the Warsaw Chopin to the Chopinof Paris. And they all dance. They are a veritable Dance of the Nerves. The more celebrated are the two in A flat, Opus 42, and C sharp minor, Opus 64, No. 2. The first and the last in A minor, Opus 34, and E minor [posthumous] exhale melancholy. But the one in D flat named Valses, too,

—

the Valse of the Little

Dog

— and those

in

G flat

and Aflat are delightful in their swinging rhythms

is

the very epitome of Chopin's inner-

mingled with opposing work.

his

own sense of impotence

qualities

The

gave birth

—

these

to this magnificent

original connotation of Scherzo

jesting, but as

Schumann

Gravity to clothe

"How

justly asks:

itself if Jest

goes about

in

is is

dark

veils?"

We may claim

then that the forty numbers in volume are fairly representative of Chopin's genius. Music such as the Barcarolle, the F minor Fantaisie, the Krakowiak or the Allegro de Concert is not for the amateur, so does not come within this

the scope of these selections. Various editions

have been consulted for the fingering, phrasing, dynamics, pedaling, tempt, etc. All that the student requires for biographical or

Chopin may be found

in the

raphy by Frederick Niecks,

critical

study of

comprehensive biogin

Franz Liszt's

bril-

liantmonograph, in the Letters edited by Moritz Karosowski,in Henry T. Finck's"Chopin,"and

andsubtleavoidanceof the banal accent. With the

two small pamphlets entitled respectively " The Works of Frederic Chopin and their Proper

famous Scherzo in B flatminor thevolumeiscomplete. This Byronic poem full of fire, fury, and

They are written by Jean Kleczynski of Warsaw.

in the

Interpretation,"

and" Chopin's Greater Works."

?X>C4JLS

;

THE CHOPIN PLAYER The sounds

torture

me: I

see

them

in

my brain;

They spin a flickering web of living threads, Like butterflies upon the garden beds, Nets of bright sound. I follow them : in vain. I must not brush the least dust from their wings: They die of a touch; but I must capture them,

Or they will turn to a caressing flame, And lick my soul up with their flutterings. The sounds

me: I count them with my

torture

I feel them like a thirst between Is it

my

With

body or

little

my

delicately at

eyes,

lips

soul that cries

colored mouths of sound,

In these bright drops that turn

Dying

my

my finger

and drips

to butterflies

tips ?

ARTHUR SYMONS

Frederic Chopin his time.

is

the proudest poetic spirit of

robert Schumann

FORTY PIANO COMPOSITIONS BY FREDERIC CHOPIN

AMTJ.C.Kessler

PRELUDE, in *

C

(September 1889)

FREDERIC CHOPIN Op. 28, NO 1

Agitato 5

$&

&

$fc

# 'U

* ®&

Throughout the volume the given dates are those of publication. Oliver Eitson

Compa

*

.

&g~

'i

*

l

Vw

* ^

c

rt

«0#0

r^

00Ctf



» ^M^

«

n~tf&® aotto voce

m

%M

**

P==£

yr^JuJ ^^i

a yi iA

j&:

fc

i£

P

i

I

Pii pp

i

sempre pin

W m

f/t'm.

risvegliato

,s

;

*

m-

^m SM

W

27

A MV- Leon Szmitkowski

MAZURKA,inAFlat (September 1842)

FREDERIC CHOPIN Op. 50, NO 2

Allegretto

t^XS F^zf

i*—ur

f—or ?—or

r

28

rfi

,1?.],

iflj^-tj

29

$*.*$& /

30

MAZURKA,in A Minor (

Posthumous) (1827)

FREDERIC CHOPIN

Lento

Op.«8,N02 (.

Oliver Ditson

Company

31

a tempo

^m ^^—

Poco piu mosso

^m ^m p

T

mf P--

1 id

j

j

9*.

I

^

,-j

r ?

»v

I

^

r?

p

»>_

fca£^

i

PP

mf.

n*

iSS

*

«&fc



fr

K

=£^M

i

I

r

r

rT r

r

Irll

r

T

ff

r

r

y

^Trf

r

H

rr frf i

rrfrf

H

f

I

^^

rpfrrrrff

T

i

H

i

~tt

39

\i)

f\

""s

41

rfu

p r

42

A

Madame

STUDY,

la

in

Comtesse d'Agoult

C sharp Minor

(October 1837

)

FREDERIC CHOPIN Op.25,

Lento

(J- 6e)

NO

7

— 43

]?£

i

%k& ff^g

A *

rit.

ur

l||g

m

Vte'ff.!

m

a

*ffl

^

4

^

&

tn

a

.£/>

i£E ^st

f*

z:

'¥

/2P

K ML -116 -4

44

nh

r

T

" "r

^>W

mm

p

JS»».

#A-4

2

S S S S

S C

=g i*«

t

a

i

« « #t t

*

^ #

f

# *

#

45

^m

rr\

13