
Chopin's Small Miracles - grellas
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703447004575449732019362448.html?mod=WSJ_LifeStyle_Lifestyle_5
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pohl
_Bach's preludes, some of considerable length, need their fugues,... Each of
Chopin's Preludes is self-sufficient, but they were composed, like Bach's,
with one for each major and minor key. Since nothing follows them, one may ask
what these works are a prelude to..._

Excellent article, but this little bit is inaccurate. The article gets the
above almost exactly backwards, because one could make a case that it is the
fugue that needs the prelude - but I say "almost" because both are self-
contained pieces and neither needs the other. Rather, the prelude exists as an
aid to audiences with untrained ears. That is, it is not the fugue that needs
the prelude, but the audience who "needs" it, for it was intended to help them
make better sense out of a fugue, which were considered to be sufficiently
complex to warrant a little extra context prior to listening.

The prelude helped them by being a less complex piece but in the same key as
the fugue it precedes. Listening to the prelude prior to hearing the fugue
helped to "establish the key". By the time the prelude was finished, it would
have taken the listener's ear on a brief journey around the notes of the
piece's scale, resolving to (and thereby drawing the listener's attention to)
the note that serves as the key's tonic, and also to whether the 3rd was a
major 3rd or a minor 3rd. Once the ear was calibrated in this manner, it was
thought that the interweaving lines of the fugue would be easier to follow.

------
davepeck
I became fascinated with Chopin's preludes about two years ago, and have
devoted some part of my free time to studying them.

Of all the recordings I've found, the recent recording of Rafal Blechacz is by
far my favorite. [1]

Blechacz took first prize in the International Chopin Competition in 2005.
Entertainingly, he was considered so much better than his competition that no
second place prize was awarded. Contrast: in 1990 and 1995, the field was
considered sub-par; no first place prizes were awarded! [2]

To follow Blechacz's performance with the actual score [3] is a special treat,
and was the start of my interest in these great works.

\---

[1] <http://www.amazon.com/Chopin-Préludes/dp/B0017QJO44/>

[2]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Frédéric_Chopin_P...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Frédéric_Chopin_Piano_Competition)

[3]
[http://imslp.info/files/imglnks/usimg/8/83/IMSLP00485-Chopin...](http://imslp.info/files/imglnks/usimg/8/83/IMSLP00485-Chopin_-
_Preludes__Op_28.pdf)

~~~
cageface
Alexandre Tharaud's recording is good too: [http://www.amazon.com/Chopin-
Pr%C3%A9ludes-Op-28/dp/B0012X2C...](http://www.amazon.com/Chopin-
Pr%C3%A9ludes-Op-28/dp/B0012X2CXM/)

The preludes seem to me to prefigure jazz in some passages.

------
elblanco
It has always been interesting to me that, while I can certainly appreciate
that more "clinical" aspects of Chopin...the technicality of the writing, the
skill of great performances, the difficulty of the music, Chopin's place in
musical history, etc., and I can certainly appreciate the beauty of his music,
I've never been able to reach a place with his music (and generally with most
of the music of the Romantics) where it "speaks" to me -- where I can make a
connection with it.

I suppose it's because I've never found myself have an aesthetic chill to this
type of music...but put on a decent record of Bach's Brandenburg 3 -
allegro...and I feel instantly like the world and humanity was advanced
forward two full steps by this one piece of music. Likewise with numerous
pieces. But when analyzing the music, the clockwork precision of Bach's music
"feels" cold and emotionless, sterile compared to Chopin, yet it's Bach's
music that makes me feel an emotional connection and not Chopin.

But I know plenty of people who are the opposite. Who fall into ecstatic bliss
the moment some Liszt or Chopin plays.

I've always wondered what this meant.

(that being said....Beethoven's 7th 2nd movement almost always leaves me
breathless and in tears).

~~~
maxawaytoolong
I am exactly the opposite. I can (and often do) listen to Chopin all day. Bach
sounds like weird robot music to me.

However, Bach is fun to play, whereas Chopin is too hard...

~~~
ryan-allen
An easy(ish) Chopin nocturne is No. 6 in G minor. It's popular amongst
beginner/intermediate players because it's a lot less technically difficult
than his other pieces.

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icarus_drowning
In college, my music history teacher always told us that "every
instrumentalist harbors a secret desire to be a singer". (It was always
startling when he said this-- he was the school's orchestra conductor and a
semi-famous Cellist, and was often dismissive of singers as "lazy musicians").

More than any other composer (at least for piano), Chopin seems most gifted in
his ability to write music that, for all intents and purposes, is singing with
the piano.

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RiderOfGiraffes
Earlier discussion about Chopin can be found here:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1147880>

He is clearly a favorite among HNers.

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cageface
Over the years I seem to have lost my taste for a lot of the romantics and
have been listening a lot more to music from Bach and earlier. Chopin still
captivates me though, as do Ravel and Debussy.

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Pistos2
Chopin is my absolutely favourite composer. I hope I am not out of place in
wishing for more such submissions (links) from HN (music-related ones, that
is).

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mds
Also Amazon sells an MP3 collection of "The 99 Most Essential Chopin
Masterpieces" for $5. I bought them because they were on sale for $1 -- that
was the start of my real appreciation for Chopin.

I've started collecting recordings of different performances of some of my
favorites. It's interesting to listen back to back and try to pick out the
nuances of how different performers interpret the same score.

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aarghh
This NPR recording with Murray Perahia further explores the connection between
Bach and Chopin:
[http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1251806...](http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125180686)

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troymc
If you want to sample assorted full-length recordings of Chopin's Preludes, do
a search on YouTube.

~~~
LURK
Don't miss this performance by Valentina Igoshina of Chopin Prelude Op. 28,
No. 7:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_Pbbcfjw4c#t=1m20s>

~~~
erikpukinskis
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8R3pjDWRKmQ&feature=relat...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8R3pjDWRKmQ&feature=related)

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knowledgesale
I find it to be waste of time when people put conscious efforts to listen to
more classical music and to educate themselves about it.

Music is usually considered to be an intellectual endeavor like art and
science. But there is a crucial difference for music. Science and art (at
least the best of it) give us new insights to the world we live in: ideally we
understand things and people more as a result.

But the ultimate purpose of music is a physiological/emotional response,
something utterly subjective and that does not enrich our objective
understanding of the world. In this sense, music should be considered to be an
indulgence like drugs, sex or delicatessen food, in all but the delivering
mechanism. Not that there is something wrong with them, but these are
pleasures, not a meaningful activity.

Thus the whole notion of the special kind of music that bears higher value is
of no more sense to me than, say, meth of higher culture.

Life is too short for it. For me if you can avoid listening to something, do
it.

~~~
icarus_drowning
Where I think you err is in stating that music doesn't give us "new insights
into the world we live in". It is precisely because music is
emotion/physiological/psychological that it gives us a great deal of insights
into not only individual human beings, but the movements and ideas of entire
societies.

Stravinsky, who's "Poetics of Music"[1] is one of the more brilliant treatises
on the importance of "high" music, once famously stated the "music doesn't
have the power to express anything at all"-- his entire belief is that music
is a reflection of the people and societies in which it develops. He above all
placed music in a higher realm because of what it uniquely taught about people

The belief that there is an objectivity to judging music isn't a popular one,
but it is one that I believe to be rather self-evident. Certainly the depth of
emotional response to the opening of Beethoven's 9th Symphony[2] should be
dramatically different from the response to the latest Britney Spears single.
Certainly Bob Dylan's music teaches us something far more complex and valuable
about the culture in which it arose than does a jingle from a car commercial.

Indeed, looking through the major musical time periods, it is clear that the
representative "geniuses" of each are are elevated as such precisely because
their music _teaches us_ something about that time period. Bach's music is
unerringly rational, but always highly ornamented. His greatest works are
often religious, and reflect the emerging force of Protestantism. Mozart's
contrast greatly, with emphasis on balance and elegance, and are often more
"absolute" (and thus "secular", although this distinction is somewhat
artificial). Etc. Etc.

Simply contrast two symphonies: Beethoven 3[3] with Copland 3[4]. I think
you'd be hard-pressed to make the argument that the boisterous triumphalism of
the former doesn't crystalize the specific emotions, cultural trends, and
overall ideas of the Napoleonic era, or that the latter could have emerged
from any culture other than that of individualist America.

And this is just scratching the surface. I haven't even mentioned the
dedecophonic serialism of Schoenberg and its clear roots in the modernist era,
and I skipped completely the Romantic era from which Chopin, the original
topic of discussion, sprung.

All of which to say, is: I think you are short-changing one of the single most
powerful elements of human culture, and in doing so, genuinely short-changing
yourself out of _both_ greater pleasure and understanding.

[1]: [http://www.amazon.com/Poetics-Music-Lessons-Harvard-
paperbac...](http://www.amazon.com/Poetics-Music-Lessons-Harvard-
paperbacks/dp/0674678567) [2]: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg5vABFHgpU>
[3]: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XL2ha18i5w> [4]:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGVvsh8BKO8> (Not the best performance, but
largely competent)

~~~
maxawaytoolong
Don't make the mistake of engagement. At some point at every company I've
worked for, we got lazy during the "cultural fit" part of the interviews and
at least one of these guys slipped through and got hired. We usually
eventually let them do something like maintain the build server or ticket
tracker. That usually kept them from doing harmful stuff like alphabetizing
the method names in classes or reformatting all the source code for "proper
indentation". The key though, is to never engage them in a conversation. Let
them go home to their silent, empty apartment and pull wings off of beetles,
or whatever their true dark passion is. But don't engage. You're just better
off not knowing how far certain peculiarities go...

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10ren
The one that inspired the author: No. 7 in A major
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UTAmV54OWE>

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dill_day
Thanks for the link- I love romantic music especially, and Chopin is the
epitome of that...beautiful. The études are also some of my favorite music.

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nphase
I was lucky enough to catch a ticket to see Pollini at CSO this spring. He
played all of Opus 28, along with a few assorted favorites. I have yet to hear
a more authentic yet passionate performance of Chopin ever.

If you get the chance to hear him before he retires (he's 68 and still going
strong!), I would strongly recommend it.

~~~
jacquesm
I am _so_ jealous.

He's probably the best Chopin player alive today (not that he's limited to
that, but I'm not aware of anybody playing Chopin as beautiful as he does) To
hear him perform live must be amazing.

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dschobel
Thanks for the link!

Chopin's preludes are just staggeringly beautiful.

