A Whole Post for Chopin

Chopin is one of those composer names that many people know even if they don't really know music.  Part of that, I think, is because it is a name that isn't pronounced the way it is spelled and that tends to come up in conversation lots.  Chopin is also a composer that has many works familiar to even the most naive classical listeners because they watch cartoons.  

Chopin is a tricky fellow.  He's kindof like Beethoven in that when you hear the music, it doesn't always sound like it's very complicated and I suppose that is part of the brilliance in his compositions is that when it is learned well and performed well, it sounds easy.  I promise it isn't.

I suppose my loyalty to Chopin partly involves from being a pianist, because most of his works are for piano.  But he is able to express power and beauty, simplicity and passion with little white and black keys that you just have to push to make sound.  He was truly astonishing.  He is also the best thing to happen to the key of C sharp minor EVER.

So here are my favorites, grouped by kind of work - this is maybe a quarter of what he wrote.  

 

Piano Concerto

1 and 2 (Two is my favorite between these two and I'm partial to the live recording of these by a 9 or 10 year old Evgeny Kissen - talk about double brilliance) 

 

Polonaise 

A major (Op 40 No 1) 

C-sharp minor (Op 26 No 1)

A flat major (Op 53) when my mom performed this in a pageant, the poor emcee didn't really know music and instead of pronouncing it like the name of the letter, he pronounced it like the article a.  Made it sound like the piano  had been tuned down to that key.  Ha ha ha!  Hmm.  That might not be funny to everyone else. 

 

Waltz 

D-flat major (Minute Waltz) Bugs Bunny could perform it in 30 seconds.

E-flat major (Grand Valse Brilliante)

C sharp minor (Op 64 No 2)

 

Nocturne 

E-flat major (Op 9 No 2) This is the song that Sharon, pretending to be Susan, plays when she is fighting with her dad in the original Parent Trap when he asks when she learned how to play the piano

B-flat minor (Op 32 No 1)

C sharp minor (Op 72 No 2 Posthumous) If you have seen the movie The Pianist, this is the nocturne that is played throughout

D flat major, (Op 27 No 2) 

 

Prelude 

D flat major (Op 28 No 15)

A major (No 7)

 

Rondo  

for Two Pianos My mom and I are currently working on performing this one - hopefully in March?

 

Fantasy Impromptu C-sharp major 

 

Etude 

C minor (Revolutionary)

 E Major (Op. 10 No. 3)

 

Ballade in A flat Major

 

Scherzo 

B-flat minor (Op 31)

B minor (Op 20)

C-sharp minor (Op 39)

 

Sonata in B-flat minor (Op 35) The third movement of this work has what is often called the Funeral March - I know you have heard at least part of this if you have ever watch a Tom and Jerry or Looney Tunes commercial where someone has (for the very brief moment) died.  Maybe in Alfred Hitchcock somewhere too.

 

I hope you and Chopin can become friends.  It's been a great relationship so far.

Visions of Sugar Plums?

I woke up early this morning. I really don't know why. It is one of those days when I can sleep until eight and still make it to choir by ten easily. Nevertheless, at 6:30 I was wide awake, thoughts racing through my head with complete abstraction and memories so powerful they were accompanied by the feelings from the experiences, but vague enough I can't remember them.

I had the chance to reconnect with a dear friend last night thanks to facebook. She moved to the school at the time when I really needed a friend. I remember finding out she was coming, that she could play volleyball and hoping with all my might that we would hit it off. We did. I consider her one of my very dearest friends from high school and am thrilled that we have found a way to keep in touch.

She is an amazingly gifted artist. As I was looking through her art and being completely blown away, I also started to have a guilty feeling creep in, that I have something of a gift or two that I really "have been too busy" to develop for the last several years. Enter the parable of the talents, the thought of trying to explain to my maker why I didn't do more, etc. That's probably contributing to the lack of sleep as well.

I have had this feeling for quite some time now that I'm not doing enough with my life. It's a gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach, encouraging me to do more, which is strange because in the past when I have had these feelings they were usually associated with guilt. This one isn't. It's like a motivational Jimminy Crickett, telling me I can do more, pleading with me to do more. Then I have been listening and reading different people of success as they talk about their days, the prophet's days, and how they were able to get everything in because of the amount of day they got out of their day and their drive to do so.

I pride myself on my ability to be disciplined. For the last six years of my public education, I was up at six and practicing the piano. I miss playing the piano for anything besides church. There are works that come on all the time that I want to learn.

I now have two novel ideas that need to be developed. I think there are some characters in there that are responsible for keeping me awake.

I keep saying I will do yoga every morning, and I always feel better when I do, but then I don't for days at a time.

It's time I did better.

The image is from my very favorite tshirt, available here