Idil Biret - Piano Sonatas 1-3 - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Album Tracks 1. Rondo, Op.1 2. Rondo a la Mazurka, Op.5 3. Rondo, Op.16 4. Rondo, Op.73 5. Mazurka in G, Bi 16 6. Mazurka in B Flat, Bi 16 7. Mazurka in B Flat, Bi 73 8. Mazurka in C, Bi 82 9. Mazurka in a Flat, Bi 7 10. Mazurka in D, Bi 4 11. Vars Brillantes, Op.12 12. Vars on a German Air 13. Vars on a March from Bellini's I Puritani 14. Vars 'Souvenir de Paganini' 15. Vars in D - Idil Biret/Martin Sauer

The greater part of Chopin's music was written for his own instrument, the piano. At first it seemed that works for piano and orchestra would be a necessary part of his stock-in-trade, but the position he found for himself in Paris enabled him to write principally for the piano alone, in a characteristic idiom that derives some inspiration from contemporary Italian opera, much from the music of Poland, and still more from his own adventurous approach to harmony and his own sheer technical ability as a player. Of the forms that Chopin used, the romantic Impromptu offered a particular freedom, with it's suggestion of music dashed off in some fine, careless rapture. His Fantaisie-Impromptu was written in 1835, but published posthumously. It was followed by three further works under the same generic title. The Mazurka, a Polish dance, provided Chopin with a basic rhythmic pattern, his first attempt made in childhood at the age of ten and his last in the year of his death. The form became one with which he was particularly closely associated, an expression of his patriotism. Writers had started to show an interest in the traditional ballad with the publication by Bishop Percy of his Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, which first appeared in the 1760s. The work of Sir Walter Scott as a collector and as a poet added to the enthusiasm. In Germany further interest was shown, with the publication of translations of ballads and the creation of new ones, first by Bürger and then by Goethe and Schiller. This literary form, reflected in ballad settings by Schubert, Loewe and others, led Chopin to a purely instrumental form, based, it has been suggested, on poems by Mickiewicz, contemporary ballads of Polish patriotic purport. The first of Chopin's four Ballades implies a narrative content, opening with the words of the story-teller and proceeding to events of greater excitement.Ch

Album Tracks 1. Impromptu No. 4 in C Sharp minor, Op. 66 Fantasie-Impromptu 2. Nocturne No. 2 in E Flat Major, Op. 9 No. 2 3. Nocturne No. 8 in D Flat Major, Op. 27 No. 2 4. Waltz No. 7 in C Sharp minor, Op. 64 No. 2 5. Waltz No. 6 in D Flat Major, Op. 64 No. 1 Minute 6. Waltz No. 1 in E Flat Major, Op. 18 Grande Valse Brillante 7. Piano Sonata No. 2 in B Flat minor, Op. 35 Marche Fun Bre 8. Mazurka No. 5 in B Flat Major, Op. 7 No. 1 9. Polonaise No. 3 in a Major, Op. 40 No. 1 Military 10. Polonaise No. 6 in a Flat Major, Op. 53 Heroic 11. Prelude No. 15 in D Flat Major, Op. 28 No. 15 Raindrop 12. Etude No. 5 in G Flat Major, Op. 10 No. 5 Black Keys 13. Etude No. 3 in E Major, Op. 10 No. 3 Tristesse 14. Etude No. 12 in C minor, Op. 10 No. 12 Revolutionary 15. Ballade No. 1 in G minor, Op. 23