Photo by Wolfgang Hasselmann curteousy of Unsplash
What’s Old is New
I recently stumbled upon a riveting homage to one of my favorite Chopin works: Mazurka Opus 17 No. 4. The piece is Gustave le Gray by Caroline Shaw, a living composer. It is her only solo piano piece and is masterfully written to incorporate the Mazurka in the middle of the piece. I hope you enjoy listening to both pieces and hearing the connection of these two pieces written centuries apart. They illustrate the timelessness of art.
Frédéric Chopin
Chopin is known as the quintessential composer for the piano. He declared, “Bach is an astronomer, discovering the most marvelous stars. Beethoven challenges the universe. I only try to express the soul and the heart of man.” A virtuosic pianist himself, he composed many styles of music for the piano, including Nocturnes, Etudes, Preludes, Sonatas, Waltzes, Mazurkas, and Polonaises. Although Chopin spent most of his life in Paris, he always claimed his heart remained in Poland, a sentiment he carried beyond the grave. Morbid tidbit: Chopin had a fear of being buried alive, so after death his heart was removed from his body and sent to Poland, where it remains today.
Mazurkas
Mazurkas are based on a Polish folk dance called the Mazu. Music writer Tom Huizenga claims that Mazurka Op. 17 no. 4 is the "Ambient" Mazurka: "Everything about it is dreamy; it floats along as if Chopin made up the music on the spot in a great opium cloud." The piece begins and ends with the same four measures later famously sampled by several composers. Henryk Górecki used them in the opening of the third movement of his third symphony, John Williams in his Empire Of The Sun, and Caroline Shaw with Gustave Le Gray.
Caroline Shaw
Caroline Shaw (b. 1982) is an American composer of contemporary classical music, violinist, and singer. She is best known for her a capella piece Partita for 8 Voices, for which she won the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for music (she is the youngest recipient). In 2022, she won a Grammy for her piece Narrow Sea.
Gustave Le Gray
According to Caroline Shaw, “Gustave Le Gray is a multi-layered portrait of [Mazurka] Op. 17 #4 using some of Chopin’s ingredients overlaid and hinged together with my own.” She names the piece after a famous French photographer, Gustave Le Gray. The piece feels a bit like time travel - where Shaw’s composition bookends the Mazurka - weaving past and present together in a photographic haze.
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