About Fryderyk Chopin
by Anna Golka
At a distance not quite a fifty miles from Warsaw, in the midst of the Mazovian fields and meadows, whose charm has been described by so many Polish poets, lays the small hamlet of Zelazowa Wola. In a quiet and modest manor house on February 22, 1810 the biggest pride of the Polish nation and the treasure to the whole world- Fryderyk Chopin was born. Zelazowa Wola formed part of the estate of a Count Skarbek. Nicolas Chopin, the composer’s father, was a tutor to the Count's young son, Fryderyk, after whom he later named his own son; Chopin’s mother, Justyna Krzyzanowska, ran the household of the Skarbek family.
Nicolas Chopin came to Poland from France at the age of sixteen. Through many years of residence in Poland as well as marriage to a Polish woman, he could speak very good Polish. He participated in the Kosciuszko Uprising as a Polish soldier, and he did indeed become a Pole.
Fryderyk Chopin's first piano teacher was his sister Ludwika. However, after one year the young student was far more advanced than his teacher, and their parents had to find a new teacher for Fryderyk. They turned to Wojciech Zywny, music teacher from Warsaw, who is to this day mentioned in virtually every music encyclopedia around the world thanks to this particular student of his, as the man who should be responsible for Fryderyk's early musical education.
Pamietnik Warszawski (The Warsaw Journal), a monthly magazine popular among the people of Warsaw, published in its January 1818 issue a list of musical works published in 1817, in which we find the following passage: A Polonaise for pianoforte, dedicated to Her Excellency Countess Victoria Skarbek, by Frederic Chopin, aged eight years. The composer of this Polish dance, a young boy of eight, is a true musical genius; for not only does he play the most difficult pieces on the piano with the greatest of ease and with extraordinarily good taste, but he is also the composer of several dances and variations, which constantly amaze the music experts.
After Chopin's family moved to Warsaw, they would return to Zelazowa Wola every summer to spend their vacations and holidays in the country. Following doctor's orders, Fryderyk's parents knew the importance of fresh air and good food for their beloved young one. Fryderyk loved this place very much. His best friends were young shepherds and children from the village. He loved to play with them, run in the fields, jump over streams, and, most of all, to listen to their songs played on wooden flutes, and watch them dance. There is a great description in the memoirs of a family friend, where he writes:
I still remember another incident that illustrates how, while still a child; he could catch folk tunes, and how carefully he listened to them. One winter evening, when returning home with his father, he heard, coming from an inn, the sounds made by a lively musician energetically playing mazurkas and obereks on his fiddle. Struck by their originality and individuality, he stood at the window, and begged his father to allow him to wait and listen to the fiddler. So, he stood there for an hour, his father trying in vain to get him to go home. Frederic would not move from the window until the fiddler had finished.
Once, one of Countess Skarbek's kitchen aids told the Countess that her younger brother heard the young son of Mr. and Mrs. Chopin play on the piano all the melodies that peasant children sing, shepherds play on flutes, and even what fiddlers play on weddings and much, much more! The Countess was very interested and sent the girl to the Chopins’ to invite them over, and for Fryderyk to play for her and her guests at a party. This was a big honor for the modest Chopin family.
Fryderyk got a new suit and a lot of instructions: how to bow, how to behave, how to answer politely, and, most importantly, what to play in front of the guests. "None of those village tunes! Play the scales and etudes which Mr. Zywny taught you,” said Fryderyk's mother, "it's not nice nor elegant to play what fiddlers and shepherds play. Remember, do not bring shame to our family." "Yes mother", replied Fryderyk. He was polite, yet sad, because those tunes were what he loved the most.
When they came to the palace, Fryderyk acted just as he was instructed and only played what he was told. However, when he finished the Countess insisted on hearing folk tunes, and, after getting his mother's permission, the little pianist forgot about the parlor full of honorable guests, and he was transported to his beloved fields, birds, flutes and played and played. He could continue forever! Suddenly, he was interrupted by the Countess, and he felt like he had been awakened from a beautiful dream. The audience was amazed and deeply moved. Fryderyk looked at his mother and felt that there was something wrong in what he did. On the way home he asked frightened, "Did I bring shame to our family, to our name?"
Fryderyk, known to his friends as Frycek, was a delicate and sickly child. His interests were many: he wrote poetry, showed talent in drawing, was an excellent mimic, had a keen sense of humor, and his childhood was by no means a dull one. In 1822 Chopin's parents placed their son under the guidance of Jozef Elsner, who was head of the Conservatory in Warsaw, with whom Fryderyk studied composition and theory. He formally entered the conservatory at the age of 16 and graduated three years later. One of Elsner's report reads: Lessons in musical composition: Chopin, Frederic, third year student, amazing capabilities, a musical genius.
Chopin's first love was Konstancja Gladkowska, the blue-eyed daughter of Commander of the Warsaw Castle, who studied singing at the same conservatory. How deep this feeling must have been can only be guessed from the beauty and quality of the works Chopin composed at this time: the Adagio from the f minor Concerto, dedicated to Miss Gladkowska, and the whole Concerto in e minor. When Chopin left Warsaw in 1830, he had a modest ring on his finger- the same as his beloved Konstancja.
He was only 20 years old, the times were very unstable, and, finally, after tremendous efforts from his family and friends, Chopin left Poland forever. Shortly thereafter, the November Insurrection started. Poland lost its freedom and ceased to exist on the maps of Europe.There was no place in this country for Polish art and Polish artists. Chopin was very sad, as he expressed in a letter to his best friend from school, Tytus Wojciechowski.
I think I am going away to forget my home forever. I think I am going away to die. How dreadful it must be to die elsewhere than where one had lived.
When Chopin appeared in Paris, he was already an excellent and mature pianist and composer. His art impressed such great virtuosos as Liszt, Paganini, and Schumann. However, his art was different than of all of these others, as his music was full of sorrow, heavily influenced by his beloved folk tunes. He was more withdrawn from crowds and concert halls, due to his limited strength. Chopin preferred to give his recitals in private homes and, indeed, made only a few public appearances during his lifetime.
He gained big fame, not only as a pianist and a composer, but as a passionate teacher, as well. It was in fashion in Paris at this time to take lessons from Maestro Chopin! We can read in the letters to his family about how successful and busy he was at this time.
I am invited everywhere. I have entree into the highest society. I sit among ambassadors, princes, and ministers. I don't even know by what miracle all this happened, for I have not pushed myself forward. I will end for now, as I have to give a lesson to young Madame Rothschild, then to a young lady from Marseilles, then to an Englishwoman, then to a Swedish lady, and at five o'clock I am to receive a family from New Orleans, who have been recommended by Pleyel himself. Later on I am invited to dinner to Leo, then to the Perthuis for the evening, and at last I shall go to bed, if that is possible.
Chopin worked a lot, usually up to eight lessons a day. He practiced and composed till late hours of the night, often neglecting his sleep, and his health. He had always been delicate and not very healthy. After six years of leading this kind of life, having no one to look after him and share his life with, tuberculosis, an incurable illness in those days, developed in his lungs. He was getting weaker and sicker everyday, but what was even more painful for him was being homesick.
The summer of 1835 was perhaps the happiest time of Chopin's life. Nicholas and Justyna Chopin, his parents, came to Carlsbad (today Karlove Vary in Slovakia) to meet their son Fryderyk. Chopin traveled by coach for weeks, via Dresden and Leipzig, as traveling in those days was much more difficult than today! Once he arrived in Carlsbad, he spent a very joyous month with his parents. After that Fryderyk never saw his parents again.
Despite all of his artistic triumphs and his successes in the highest circles of Parisian society, the moments of happiness in his life were very few. Chopin was most unhappy because his beloved homeland was in a state of war. Several times he mentioned his desire to go back to Poland and join his countrymen in their fight for freedom. Out of this sorrow came perhaps the most “national” of his compositions- the Polonaise. This style joins the old courtly dance with knightly and military traditions.
It was Robert Schumann who said the following, "Your music is like cannons hidden in roses.” Chopin’s music was the hope and spiritual support, as important for the Polish people as their battle for freedom in Poland. So, he stayed in France and kept writing mazurkas and polonaises to ease his own as well as other immigrants' sorrow. Mazurkas, the most "Polish" of Chopin's compositions, were inspired by three folk dances: the kujawiak, the mazur, and the oberek. All have 3 beats in a measure with an emphasis on the 3rd beat, but each has a different tempo and a different character. The most sentimental and slow one is the kujawiak. The mazur is the noblest one of the three and is in a moderate tempo. The vivid and energetic one, the fastest of the three, is the oberek. In the mazurkas Chopin uses a lot of original folk themes that he has kept in his heart since early childhood.
Aurora Dudevant, known as George Sand, a French novelist and a figure of great importance and influence in the highest circles of Parisian society, was Chopin's love and support during his lonely years in Paris, from 1837 to 1847. During these 9 years Chopin spent almost every summer at Nohant, George Sand's summerhouse. There he composed the most mature and splendid of his works, such as the Ballade in f minor, more than a dozen mazurkas, several nocturnes, the Sonata in b minor, and the Scherzo in E major. Mostly teaching and performing took up the remainder of his years spent in Paris.
The years 1839 to 1848 were the period when Chopin reached the peak of his fame. Fryderyk Chopin died in 1849 in Paris, being only 39 years old. In accordance with his last will, his sister Ludwika, the same one that first taught him how to play piano and who was present at his death, brought his heart back to Warsaw in a glass urn. Chopin's body was buried at Perre Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, but his heart returned home to Warsaw, Poland.
Cyprian Kamil Norwid, a great Polish romantic poet, mutual exile in France, wrote a famous last homage printed in newspapers after Chopin's death: Fryderyk Chopin, a citizen of Warsaw by birth, at heart a Pole, but a citizen of the world by virtue of his talent – has left this world. *
Fryderyk is the Polish spelling of Frederic.
by Anna Golka
At a distance not quite a fifty miles from Warsaw, in the midst of the Mazovian fields and meadows, whose charm has been described by so many Polish poets, lays the small hamlet of Zelazowa Wola. In a quiet and modest manor house on February 22, 1810 the biggest pride of the Polish nation and the treasure to the whole world- Fryderyk Chopin was born. Zelazowa Wola formed part of the estate of a Count Skarbek. Nicolas Chopin, the composer’s father, was a tutor to the Count's young son, Fryderyk, after whom he later named his own son; Chopin’s mother, Justyna Krzyzanowska, ran the household of the Skarbek family.
Nicolas Chopin came to Poland from France at the age of sixteen. Through many years of residence in Poland as well as marriage to a Polish woman, he could speak very good Polish. He participated in the Kosciuszko Uprising as a Polish soldier, and he did indeed become a Pole.
Fryderyk Chopin's first piano teacher was his sister Ludwika. However, after one year the young student was far more advanced than his teacher, and their parents had to find a new teacher for Fryderyk. They turned to Wojciech Zywny, music teacher from Warsaw, who is to this day mentioned in virtually every music encyclopedia around the world thanks to this particular student of his, as the man who should be responsible for Fryderyk's early musical education.
Pamietnik Warszawski (The Warsaw Journal), a monthly magazine popular among the people of Warsaw, published in its January 1818 issue a list of musical works published in 1817, in which we find the following passage: A Polonaise for pianoforte, dedicated to Her Excellency Countess Victoria Skarbek, by Frederic Chopin, aged eight years. The composer of this Polish dance, a young boy of eight, is a true musical genius; for not only does he play the most difficult pieces on the piano with the greatest of ease and with extraordinarily good taste, but he is also the composer of several dances and variations, which constantly amaze the music experts.
After Chopin's family moved to Warsaw, they would return to Zelazowa Wola every summer to spend their vacations and holidays in the country. Following doctor's orders, Fryderyk's parents knew the importance of fresh air and good food for their beloved young one. Fryderyk loved this place very much. His best friends were young shepherds and children from the village. He loved to play with them, run in the fields, jump over streams, and, most of all, to listen to their songs played on wooden flutes, and watch them dance. There is a great description in the memoirs of a family friend, where he writes:
I still remember another incident that illustrates how, while still a child; he could catch folk tunes, and how carefully he listened to them. One winter evening, when returning home with his father, he heard, coming from an inn, the sounds made by a lively musician energetically playing mazurkas and obereks on his fiddle. Struck by their originality and individuality, he stood at the window, and begged his father to allow him to wait and listen to the fiddler. So, he stood there for an hour, his father trying in vain to get him to go home. Frederic would not move from the window until the fiddler had finished.
Once, one of Countess Skarbek's kitchen aids told the Countess that her younger brother heard the young son of Mr. and Mrs. Chopin play on the piano all the melodies that peasant children sing, shepherds play on flutes, and even what fiddlers play on weddings and much, much more! The Countess was very interested and sent the girl to the Chopins’ to invite them over, and for Fryderyk to play for her and her guests at a party. This was a big honor for the modest Chopin family.
Fryderyk got a new suit and a lot of instructions: how to bow, how to behave, how to answer politely, and, most importantly, what to play in front of the guests. "None of those village tunes! Play the scales and etudes which Mr. Zywny taught you,” said Fryderyk's mother, "it's not nice nor elegant to play what fiddlers and shepherds play. Remember, do not bring shame to our family." "Yes mother", replied Fryderyk. He was polite, yet sad, because those tunes were what he loved the most.
When they came to the palace, Fryderyk acted just as he was instructed and only played what he was told. However, when he finished the Countess insisted on hearing folk tunes, and, after getting his mother's permission, the little pianist forgot about the parlor full of honorable guests, and he was transported to his beloved fields, birds, flutes and played and played. He could continue forever! Suddenly, he was interrupted by the Countess, and he felt like he had been awakened from a beautiful dream. The audience was amazed and deeply moved. Fryderyk looked at his mother and felt that there was something wrong in what he did. On the way home he asked frightened, "Did I bring shame to our family, to our name?"
Fryderyk, known to his friends as Frycek, was a delicate and sickly child. His interests were many: he wrote poetry, showed talent in drawing, was an excellent mimic, had a keen sense of humor, and his childhood was by no means a dull one. In 1822 Chopin's parents placed their son under the guidance of Jozef Elsner, who was head of the Conservatory in Warsaw, with whom Fryderyk studied composition and theory. He formally entered the conservatory at the age of 16 and graduated three years later. One of Elsner's report reads: Lessons in musical composition: Chopin, Frederic, third year student, amazing capabilities, a musical genius.
Chopin's first love was Konstancja Gladkowska, the blue-eyed daughter of Commander of the Warsaw Castle, who studied singing at the same conservatory. How deep this feeling must have been can only be guessed from the beauty and quality of the works Chopin composed at this time: the Adagio from the f minor Concerto, dedicated to Miss Gladkowska, and the whole Concerto in e minor. When Chopin left Warsaw in 1830, he had a modest ring on his finger- the same as his beloved Konstancja.
He was only 20 years old, the times were very unstable, and, finally, after tremendous efforts from his family and friends, Chopin left Poland forever. Shortly thereafter, the November Insurrection started. Poland lost its freedom and ceased to exist on the maps of Europe.There was no place in this country for Polish art and Polish artists. Chopin was very sad, as he expressed in a letter to his best friend from school, Tytus Wojciechowski.
I think I am going away to forget my home forever. I think I am going away to die. How dreadful it must be to die elsewhere than where one had lived.
When Chopin appeared in Paris, he was already an excellent and mature pianist and composer. His art impressed such great virtuosos as Liszt, Paganini, and Schumann. However, his art was different than of all of these others, as his music was full of sorrow, heavily influenced by his beloved folk tunes. He was more withdrawn from crowds and concert halls, due to his limited strength. Chopin preferred to give his recitals in private homes and, indeed, made only a few public appearances during his lifetime.
He gained big fame, not only as a pianist and a composer, but as a passionate teacher, as well. It was in fashion in Paris at this time to take lessons from Maestro Chopin! We can read in the letters to his family about how successful and busy he was at this time.
I am invited everywhere. I have entree into the highest society. I sit among ambassadors, princes, and ministers. I don't even know by what miracle all this happened, for I have not pushed myself forward. I will end for now, as I have to give a lesson to young Madame Rothschild, then to a young lady from Marseilles, then to an Englishwoman, then to a Swedish lady, and at five o'clock I am to receive a family from New Orleans, who have been recommended by Pleyel himself. Later on I am invited to dinner to Leo, then to the Perthuis for the evening, and at last I shall go to bed, if that is possible.
Chopin worked a lot, usually up to eight lessons a day. He practiced and composed till late hours of the night, often neglecting his sleep, and his health. He had always been delicate and not very healthy. After six years of leading this kind of life, having no one to look after him and share his life with, tuberculosis, an incurable illness in those days, developed in his lungs. He was getting weaker and sicker everyday, but what was even more painful for him was being homesick.
The summer of 1835 was perhaps the happiest time of Chopin's life. Nicholas and Justyna Chopin, his parents, came to Carlsbad (today Karlove Vary in Slovakia) to meet their son Fryderyk. Chopin traveled by coach for weeks, via Dresden and Leipzig, as traveling in those days was much more difficult than today! Once he arrived in Carlsbad, he spent a very joyous month with his parents. After that Fryderyk never saw his parents again.
Despite all of his artistic triumphs and his successes in the highest circles of Parisian society, the moments of happiness in his life were very few. Chopin was most unhappy because his beloved homeland was in a state of war. Several times he mentioned his desire to go back to Poland and join his countrymen in their fight for freedom. Out of this sorrow came perhaps the most “national” of his compositions- the Polonaise. This style joins the old courtly dance with knightly and military traditions.
It was Robert Schumann who said the following, "Your music is like cannons hidden in roses.” Chopin’s music was the hope and spiritual support, as important for the Polish people as their battle for freedom in Poland. So, he stayed in France and kept writing mazurkas and polonaises to ease his own as well as other immigrants' sorrow. Mazurkas, the most "Polish" of Chopin's compositions, were inspired by three folk dances: the kujawiak, the mazur, and the oberek. All have 3 beats in a measure with an emphasis on the 3rd beat, but each has a different tempo and a different character. The most sentimental and slow one is the kujawiak. The mazur is the noblest one of the three and is in a moderate tempo. The vivid and energetic one, the fastest of the three, is the oberek. In the mazurkas Chopin uses a lot of original folk themes that he has kept in his heart since early childhood.
Aurora Dudevant, known as George Sand, a French novelist and a figure of great importance and influence in the highest circles of Parisian society, was Chopin's love and support during his lonely years in Paris, from 1837 to 1847. During these 9 years Chopin spent almost every summer at Nohant, George Sand's summerhouse. There he composed the most mature and splendid of his works, such as the Ballade in f minor, more than a dozen mazurkas, several nocturnes, the Sonata in b minor, and the Scherzo in E major. Mostly teaching and performing took up the remainder of his years spent in Paris.
The years 1839 to 1848 were the period when Chopin reached the peak of his fame. Fryderyk Chopin died in 1849 in Paris, being only 39 years old. In accordance with his last will, his sister Ludwika, the same one that first taught him how to play piano and who was present at his death, brought his heart back to Warsaw in a glass urn. Chopin's body was buried at Perre Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, but his heart returned home to Warsaw, Poland.
Cyprian Kamil Norwid, a great Polish romantic poet, mutual exile in France, wrote a famous last homage printed in newspapers after Chopin's death: Fryderyk Chopin, a citizen of Warsaw by birth, at heart a Pole, but a citizen of the world by virtue of his talent – has left this world. *
Fryderyk is the Polish spelling of Frederic.