Op. 30 No. 3

Five Mazurkas

in G sharp minor, Op.33, No.1

in D flat major, Op.30, No.3

in F minor, Op.63, No.2

in C sharp minor, Op.63, No.3

in B flat minor, Op.24, No.4

Should the Mazurka in G sharp minor should be played Presto as in the first French edition, and as apparently indicated by the composer in his manuscript in 1838,Mesto as in the first German edition, or Lento as marked in Chopin’s hand in copies belonging to his pupils? There is not much difference between Lento and Mesto (“sad”), both of which directions seem appropriate to the harmonies and the texture of at least the outer sections of the piece. A Presto tempo, on the other hand, would give it a severe jolt - though not necessarily, depending on how it is done, a harmful one. Jolts are not excluded from Chopin mazurkas, as the extreme dynamic contrasts applied to the main theme of the one in D flat major from Op.30 clearly confirms.

Such energy as Chopin displays in Op.30, No.3, so vigorously transferring the rhythmic emphasis from the first to the second beat of the bar in the repeated notes at the beginning, becomes ever rarer in the mazurkas as he gets older. The three mazurkas of Op.63, the last to be published in the composer’s lifetime, were written in 1846, shortly after the completion of the Polonaise-Fantaisie and the Barcarolle, and are not yet as resigned as the two late examples (in G minor and F minor) from the summer of 1849. There is, however, an expression of pain in the appoggiaturas associated with the main theme of the Mazurka in F minor and, though based on the relative major, the chromatic harmonies of the middle section do little to relieve the situation. The Mazurka in C sharp minor, which has something of the exquisitely nostalgic atmosphere of the nocturnes, ends with a beautifully contrived canon at the octave with the lower voice shared between left hand and right.

The earliest mazurka in the present selection - in B flat minor Op.24, No.4, completed in 1835 - is structurally the most ambitious and in some ways the most inspired. In the variety of its material, the harmonic adventures experienced by its main themes and the expressive attitudes they assume, it is almost a ballade. At the same time, as Chopin so conscientiously alternates between episodes with the rhythmic emphasis on the third beat in the bar and others with the emphasis on the second, it is the essential mazurka.