Chopin: discovered new Prélude in E flat minor

Frydery Chopin (1810-1849)

Prélude in E flat minor (1839)

It is just 33 measures long, but it reveals a world about Chopin the innovator and Chopin the bedeviled. Call it Chopin's lost "Devil's Trill" Prelude.

The piece, intended as the 14th Prélude of the collection of 24, but ultimately discarded. It's only the second known complete, unpublished Chopin sketch.

The existence of the work, in the collection of the Morgan Library, was widely known among Chopin scholars.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Chopin:
• discovered
• new
• Prélude
• in
• flat
• minor

[cziffra1980]

@Lisztianpiano The score looks so vague to me that half of the harmonies can only be complete guesswork. Sounds like utter nonsense.

[Lisztianpiano]

I wonder why people think this doesn't sound like Chopin, as if to say he couldn't write some bizarre music? I don't think his finale to the b-flat minor sonata is any more strange than this. In fact this piece even establishes the tonic more regularly. From my understanding, this is just officially a sketch, perhaps unfinished, and possibly written later in his life?

[Valiregirl82]

i'm a big fan of chopin but i can say that this is not the best of his work. this seems more of a sketch that he hasn't finished or that has just been thrown away

[theblueisyou]

lmao pure shit. not chopin.

[Gunnarchopin]

Highly interesting! One easily thinks of the finale of his second sonata, or the prélude op. 28 no. 14. Although a sketch, the piece is a sinister statement of his art, almost angry, definitely original in the utmost sense.

[Sword1479]

...Wow. This was amazing. I mean, this is as disturbing as the finale to his second sonata! Chopin was a genius!

[MrChopin333]

chopin knew what he did when he wrote the devil`s trill. he saw this near the end and he said" My nose is long but my 4th finger is out of practice but george here is the devil`s trill so the world will know that the devil`s trill is not a foolish parody a mans angst against the world or just some song I wrote before I passed into the highlands, I want the world to know that I was a piano player and also George Sand Let them also know we are lovers and Franz Liszt, keep an eye on him when I die.

[WhiteButterfly87]

@cziffra1980 that score is utterly dreadful!!

[makro12able]

Not Chopin!!!

[100of1000]

no no, first part maybe Chopin but only scheme, ending part is XX c music I suppose only :)

[SHINYamAHA21]

Watduh

Arghhhhhhhhhh

Jeffry Kallbergh...Je ris.

[MrRicksStudio]

There was an article in the August 2001 issue of "Early Music" by Kallberg. It includes a copy of the manuscript, the score, and an article telling how he pieced it together. The score is more Kallberg than Chopin.