Frederick Chopin, as a Man and Musician — Complete

by Frederick Niecks

It seems to me that Chopin sketched the whole of it, and that
Franchomme said "yes" to everything; for what Chopin touches
takes his form and spirit, and in this minor salon-style he
expresses himself with grace and distinction, compared with
which all the gentility of other brilliant composers together
with all their elegance vanish into thin air.

The mention of the DUO is somewhat out of place here, but the Sonata, Op. 65, in which the violoncello is employed, naturally suggested it.

We have only one more work to consider before we come to the groups of masterpieces in the smaller forms above enumerated. But this last work is one of Chopin's best compositions, and in its way no less a masterpiece than these. Unfettered by the scheme of a definite form such as the sonata or concerto, the composer develops in the Fantaisie, Op. 49 (published in November, 1841), his thought with masterly freedom. There is an enthralling weirdness about this work, a weirdness made up of force of passion and an indescribable fantastic waywardness. Nothing more common than the name of Fantasia, here we have the thing! The music falls on our ears like the insuppressible outpouring of a being stirred to its heart's core, and full of immeasurable love and longing. Who would suspect the composer's fragility and sickliness in this work? Does it not rather suggest a Titan in commotion? There was a time when I spoke of the Fantasia in a less complimentary tone, now I bow down my head regretfully and exclaim peccavi. The disposition of the composition may be thus briefly indicated. A tempo di marcia opens the Fantasia—it forms the porch of the edifice. The dreamy triplet passages of the poco a poco piu mosso are comparable to galleries that connect the various blocks of buildings. The principal subject, or accumulation of themes, recurs again and again in different keys, whilst other subjects appear only once or twice between the repetitions of the principal subject.

The mazurkas of Chopin are a literature in themselves, said Lenz, and there is some truth in his saying. They may, indeed, be called a literature in themselves for two reasons—first, because of their originality, which makes them things sui generis; and secondly, because of the poetical and musical wealth of their contents. Chopin, as I have already said, is most national in the mazurkas and polonaises, for the former of which he draws not only inspiration, but even rhythmic, melodic, and harmonic motives from his country's folk-music. Liszt told me, in a conversation I had with him, that he did not care much for Chopin's mazurkas. "One often meets in them with bars which might just as well be in another place." But he added, "And yet as Chopin puts them, perhaps nobody else could have put them." And mark, those are the words of one who also told me that when he sometimes played half-an-hour for his amusement, he liked to resort to Chopin. Moscheles, I suspect, had especially the mazurkas in his mind when, in 1833, [FOOTNOTE: At this time the published compositions of Chopin were, of course, not numerous, but they included the first two books of Mazurkas, Op. 6 and 7.] he said of the Polish master's compositions that he found "much charm in their originality and national colouring," and that "his thoughts and through them the fingers stumbled over certain hard, inartistic modulations." Startling progressions, unreconciled contrasts, and abrupt changes of mood are characteristic of Slavonic music and expressive of the Slavonic character. Whether they ought to be called inartistic or not, we will leave time to decide, if it has not done so already; the Russian and other Slavonic composers, who are now coming more and more to the front, seem to be little in doubt as to their legitimacy. I neither regard Chopin's mazurkas as his most artistic achievements nor recommend their capriciousness and fragmentariness for general imitation. But if we view them from the right stand-point, which is not that of classicism, we cannot help admiring them. The musical idiom which the composer uses in these, notwithstanding their capriciousness and fragmentariness, exquisitely-finished miniatures, has a truly delightful piquancy. Yet delightful as their language is, the mazurkas have a far higher claim to our admiration. They are poems—social poems, poems of private life, in distinction from the polonaises, which are political poems. Although Chopin's mazurkas and polonaises are no less individual than the other compositions of this most subjective of subjective poets, they incorporate, nevertheless, a good deal of the poetry of which the national dances of those names are the expression or vehicle. And let it be noted, in Poland so-called civilisation did not do its work so fast and effectually as in Western Europe; there dancing had not yet become in Chopin's days a merely formal and conventional affair, a matter of sinew and muscle.

It is, therefore, advisable that we should make ourselves acquainted with the principal Polish dances; such an acquaintance, moreover, will not only help us to interpret aright Chopin's mazurkas and polonaises, but also to gain a deeper insight into his ways of feeling and seeing generally. Now the reader will become aware that the long disquisitions on Poland and the Poles at the commencement of this biography were not superfluous accessories. For completeness' sake I shall preface the description of the mazurka by a short one of the krakowiak, the third of the triad of principal Polish dances. The informants on whom I shall chiefly rely when I am not guided by my own observations are the musician Sowinski and the poet Brodzinski, both Poles:

The krakowiak [says Albert Sowinski in chant polonais] bubbles
over with esprit and gaiety; its name indicates its origin. It
is the delight of the salons, and especially of the huts. The
Cracovians dance it in a very agitated and expressive manner,
singing at the same time words made for the occasion of which
they multiply the stanzas and which they often improvise.
These words are of an easy gaiety which remind one strangely
of the rather loose [semi-grivoises] songs so popular in
France; others again are connected with the glorious epochs of
history, with the sweet or sad memories which it calls up, and
are a faithful expression of the character and manners of the
nation.

Casimir Brodzinski describes the dance as follows:—

The krakowiak resembles in its figures a simplified polonaise;
it represents, compared with the latter, a less advanced
social state. The boldest and strongest takes the position of
leader and conducts the dance; he sings, the others join in
chorus; he dances, they imitate him. Often also the krakowiak
represents, in a kind of little ballet, the simple course of a
love-affair: one sees a couple of young people place
themselves before the orchestra; the young man looks proud,
presumptuous, preoccupied with his costume and beauty. Before
long he becomes meditative, and seeks inspiration to improvise
verses which the cries of his companions ask for, and which
the time beaten by them provoke, as well as the manoeuvre of
the young girl, who is impatient to dance. Arriving before the
orchestra after making a round, the dancer generally takes the
liberty of singing a refrain which makes the young girl blush;
she runs away, and it is in pursuing her that the young man
displays all his agility. At the last round it is the young
man who pretends to run away from his partner; she tries to
seize his arm, after which they dance together until the
ritornello puts an end to their pleasure.

As a technical supplement to the above, I may say that this lively dance is in 2/4 time, and like other Polish dances has the rhythmical peculiarity of having frequently the accent on a usually unaccented part of the bar, especially at the end of a section or a phrase, for instance, on the second quaver of the second and the fourth bar, thus:—

[Here, the author illustrates with a rhythm diagram consisting of a line of notes divided in measures: 1/8 1/16 1/16 1/8 1/8 | 1/8 1/4 1/8 | 1/8 1/16 1/16 1/8 1/8 | 1/8 1/4 dot]