Fryderyk Chopin: 'The Poet of the Piano'

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Fryderyk Chopin - Grande Polonaise Brillante premières at the Paris Conservatory

On this day in 1835, Fryderyk Chopin's Grande Polonaise Brillante, preceded by the Andante spianato was premièred at the Paris Conservatory. Chopin performed it, with marked success in a charity concert for the then famous Parisian conductor François-Antoine Habeneck.

Listen to it on our playlist:




Paris Conservatoire depicted by  P. S. Germain

It was not until 1834-1835, in Paris, that Chopin added the introduction, given over to the solo piano. Some commentators consider that the two parts – the introductory Andante spianato and the actual Polonaise – do not suit one another, as they are too different. Yet that very diametrical contrast is what seems to link the two parts together. Spianato means evenly, without contrasts, without any great agitation or anxiety. A 'polonaise' or 'polonez' is a dignified ceremonial dance, adopted by Polish nobility. The listener is drawn into a trance by the magic of music from the boundaries of dream and reality, before being roused, with the sound of the orchestral tutti and the rhythms of the polonaise, to a new life. The end result is a work in grand style, brilliant and virtuosic and that is how it was called when it came to be published: Grande Polonaise Brillante, précédée d’un Andante spianato.  

Fryderyk Chopin (1810 - 49)

Every single one of Chopin's compositions involves the piano - for him it was his entire reason for existence. Performer as well as composer, Chopin was responsible more than any other composer, for the development of modern piano technique and style - expressive, singing-like and exquisite. 
But just as the music of the 'Grande Polonaise' constituted the final farewell of Chopin the composer to a purely virtuosic style, so that concert was the last grand concert given in Paris by Chopin the virtuoso. As a pianist, he left the grand concert platform, and as a composer he entered the peak phase of his fully mature individual style – a style in which pianistic virtuosity was placed at the service of expression.

Sources: Mieczysław Tomaszewski from The Fryderyk Chopin Institute, Encyclopedia Brittanica, Jeremy Nicholas 'The Great Composers'

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