Frédéric Chopin's Op. 10 and Op. 25 Études (published 1833-37) are crafted around specific technical challenges, including arpeggiated chords, double notes, and left-hand dexterity. His Études expanded the limits of 19th-century piano technique, elevating practical exercises to artistic masterpieces by combining musical substance with technical challenges. This approach paved the way for future composers such as Schumann, Debussy, Prokofiev, and Rachmaninoff to compose in a similar style. Furthermore, it has established a place for Chopin's Études in the core canon of classical piano for over 185 years. The two-volume Chopin Fragments series reworks elements of Chopin's Op. 10 and Op. 25 Études as studies for classical and creative pianists and composers. These books are intended to inspire musicians who would like to apply these concepts to their own playing and compositions. It is also intended for pianists well-versed in Chopin's Études seeking to achieve equal mastery of his techniques in 12 keys. These books distill specific technical challenges that highlight the use of Chopin's techniques beyond the scope of his original work. From each Étude, a short fragment has been extracted, modified, and, on occasion, expanded over an extended range. The changes result in four-to-eight-measure studies on each Étude. Studies inspired by the Op. 10 Études are found in Volume 1, and Volume 2 contains Op. 25-inspired studies. Each study is introduced in the original key presented in Chopin's Études, with fingerings and articulations, followed by transpositions in the remaining 11 keys. The notated transpositions are provided to assist with learning these studies in all keys; however, I challenge you to analyze each study and, whenever possible, transpose it to the other keys without reading the transposed notation. Finally, the studies included within the Chopin Fragments series only represent a small fraction of the inspiring ideas Chopin offers in his Études. Therefore, as you work through these volumes, I encourage you to revisit (or explore) Chopin's original Op. 10 and Op. 25 works. Try fashioning your own fragments from a different portion of each Étude, or reimagine the studies within these pages using your own creative ideas.

“An effort to expand sonata theory more solidly into the nineteenth-century repertoire.” —Notes In Sonata Fragments, Andrew Davis argues that the Romantic sonata is firmly rooted, both formally and expressively, in its Classical forebears, using Classical conventions in order to convey a broad constellation of Romantic aesthetic values. This claim runs contrary to conventional theories of the Romantic sonata that place this nineteenth-century musical form squarely outside inherited Classical sonata procedures. Building on Sonata Theory, Davis examines moments of fracture and fragmentation that disrupt the cohesive and linear temporality in piano sonatas by Chopin, Brahms, and Schumann. These disruptions in the sonata form are a narrative technique that signify temporal shifts during which we move from the outer action to the inner thoughts of a musical agent, or we move from the story as it unfolds to a flashback or flash-forward. Through an interpretation of Romantic sonatas as temporally multi-dimensional works in which portions of the music in any given piece can lie inside or outside of what Sonata Theory would define as the sonata-space proper, Davis reads into these ruptures a narrative of expressive features that mark these sonatas as uniquely Romantic. “A major achievement.” —Michael L. Klein, author of Music and the Crises of the Modern Subject

This anthology of contemporary poetry celebrates the 200th birth anniversary of Fryderyk Chopin (1810-1849). The volume presents 123 poems by 92 poets, including: Sharon Chmielarz, T. S. Eliot, Charles Ades Fishman, Linda Nemec Foster, Emily Fragos, John Z. Guzlowski, Lola Haskins, Oriana Ivy, Lois P. Jones, Leonard Kress, Emma Lazarus, Marie Lecrivain, Jeffrey Levine, Amy Lowell, Rick Lupert, Mira N. Mataric, Elisabeth Murawski, Ruth Nolan, Cyprian Kamil Norwid, William Pillin, Russell Salamon, Katrin Talbot, Mark Tardi, Devi Walders, Kath Abela Wilson, and others. The book is illustrated with vintage Chopin postcards and includes one translation - of "Chopin's Piano" by Norwid. The editor, Dr. Maja Trochimczyk, is a Polish-American poet, music historian, photographer, and translator. She published four books on music, two books of poetry, and hundreds of articles and poems.

Whether social, cultural, or individual, the act of imagination always derives from a pre-existing context. For example, we can conjure an alien's scream from previously heard wildlife recordings or mentally rehearse a piece of music while waiting for a train. This process is no less true for the role of imagination in sonic events and artifacts. Many existing works on sonic imagination tend to discuss musical imagination through terms like compositional creativity or performance technique. In this two-volume Handbook, contributors shift the focus of imagination away from the visual by addressing the topic of sonic imagination and expanding the field beyond musical compositional creativity and performance technique into other aural arenas where the imagination holds similar power. Topics covered include auditory imagery and the neurology of sonic imagination; aural hallucination and illusion; use of metaphor in the recording studio; the projection of acoustic imagination in architectural design; and the design of sound artifacts for cinema and computer games.

'A book that no serious student should be without... refreshingly sane.' Jeremy Siepmann, Classical Music 'An immensely valuable and well-researched book.' Stephen Haylett, BBC Music Magazine 'Intermittently engrossing...' Susan Bradshaw, Musical Times.

The Cambridge Companion to Chopin provides the enquiring music-lover with helpful insights into a musical style which recognises no contradiction between the accessible and the sophisticated, the popular and the significant. Twelve essays by leading Chopin scholars make up three parts. Part 1 discusses the sources of Chopin's style in the music of his predecessors and the social history of the period. Part 2 profiles the mature music, and Part 3 considers the afterlife of the music - its reception, its criticism and its compositional influence in the works of subsequent composers.

Reproduction of the original. The publishing house Megali specialises in reproducing historical works in large print to make reading easier for people with impaired vision.