The Four Ballades, composed between 1831 and 1842, are perhaps the most perfect examples of Chopin's instinctive sense of musical shape and tonal organisation. The sheer technical finesse of his piano ...

People have been singing ballads since the beginning of human history, and poets have been writing them for almost that long. But it took Frederic Chopin to turn the ballad (or ballade, as he called ...

Following on from his Chopin Preludes disc comes Li Yundi’s first recording of what are arguably the composer’s biggest challenges: the four Ballades. They are coolly but compellingly dispatched, with ...

How to make the Chopin Ballades sound fresh? For the veteran British pianist Stephen Hough, who essayed the complete set in the second half of his Friday recital in Rockport, the answer lies in ...

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. How did Chopin play the piano? A veil of mystery will always stand between us and composers who lived before ...

This epic Chopin ballade takes its time to get going, but once it does you'll be completely swept along. Chopin initially composed his set of one-movement ballades between 1831 and 1842, and quickly ...

In his booklet notes for Chopin’s Ballades and Piano Sonata No 3, Jae-Hyuck Cho speaks of his goal to attain a genuine, singing legato on the piano. One suspects that this quest is at least partially ...

Stephen Johnson is joined by pianist Cedric Tiberghien for an exploration of Chopin's Four Ballades and their possible hidden links to literature. With conductor and researcher Christopher Gayford, ...

As a pianist, Frederic Chopin possessed talents beyond emulation. He had an impact on other musicians entirely out of proportion to the number of concerts he gave — only 30 public performances in 30 ...

Nocturnes, Movements: No. 4 in F, Op. 15/1 Fryderyk Chopin, Composer Leif Ove Andsnes, Piano Nocturnes, Movements: No. 13 in C minor, Op. 48/1 Leif Ove Andsnes, Piano Fryderyk Chopin, Composer ...