Étude Op. 10, No.1 in C major

C major

C major is a musical major scale based on C, with pitches C, D, E, F, G, A, and B. Its key signature has no flats/sharps.Its relative minor is A minor, and its parallel minor is C minor....

 is a study for solo

Solo (music)

In music, a solo is a piece or a section of a piece played or sung by a single performer...

 piano

Piano

The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...

 composed by Frédéric Chopin

Frédéric Chopin

Frédéric François Chopin was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist. He is considered one of the great masters of Romantic music and has been called "the poet of the piano"....

 in 1829. It was first published in 1833 in France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

, and England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 as the first piece of his Études Op. 10

Études (Chopin)

The Études by Frédéric Chopin are three sets of solo studies for the piano, There are twenty-seven overall, comprising two separate collections of twelve, numbered Opus 10 and 25, and a set of three without opus number.-Composition:...

. This study in reach and arpeggios focuses on stretching the fingers of the right hand. The American music critic James Huneker

James Huneker

James Gibbons Huneker was an American music writer and critic.Huneker was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He studied piano in Europe under Leopold Doutreleau and audited the Paris piano class of Frédéric Chopin's pupil Georges Mathias. He came to New York City in 1885 and remained there...

 (1857–1921) compared the "hypnotic charm" that these "dizzy acclivities and descents exercise for eye as well as ear" to the frightening staircases in Giovanni Battista Piranesi

Giovanni Battista Piranesi

Giovanni Battista Piranesi was an Italian artist famous for his etchings of Rome and of fictitious and atmospheric "prisons" .-His Life:...

's prints of the Carceri d'invenzione. Virtuoso pianist Vladimir Horowitz

Vladimir Horowitz

Vladimir Samoylovich Horowitz    was a Russian-American classical virtuoso pianist and minor composer. His technique and use of tone color and the excitement of his playing were legendary. He is widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century.-Life and early...

, who refused to perform this étude in public, said, "For me, the most difficult one of all (the études) is the C Major, the first one, Op. 10, No. 1."

Structure and stylistic traits

The étude, like all études by Chopin, is in ternary form

Ternary form

Ternary form, sometimes called song form, is a three-part musical form, usually schematicized as A-B-A. The first and third parts are musically identical, or very nearly so, while the second part in some way provides a contrast with them...

 (A–B–A), recapitulating the first part. The first part of the middle section introduces chromaticism

Chromaticism

Chromaticism is a compositional technique interspersing the primary diatonic pitches and chords with other pitches of the chromatic scale. Chromaticism is in contrast or addition to tonality or diatonicism...

 in the left hand octave melody

Melody

A melody , also tune, voice, or line, is a linear succession of musical tones which is perceived as a single entity...

 while the second one modulates to the C major recapitulation

Recapitulation (music)

In music theory, the recapitulation is one of the sections of a movement written in sonata form. The recapitulation occurs after the movement's development section, and typically presents once more the musical themes from the movement's exposition...

 via an extended circle of fifths

Circle of fifths

In music theory, the circle of fifths shows the relationships among the 12 tones of the chromatic scale, their corresponding key signatures, and the associated major and minor keys...

.

James Huneker states that Chopin wished to begin the "exposition of his wonderful technical system" with a "skeletonized statement" and compares the étude to a "tree stripped of its bark."
Its harmonies resemble a chorale

Chorale

A chorale was originally a hymn sung by a Christian congregation. In certain modern usage, this term may also include classical settings of such hymns and works of a similar character....

 and its relationship to Bach’s

Johann Sebastian Bach

Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...

 Prelude No.1 in C major (BWV 846) from the Well Tempered Clavier has been noted, among others, by musicologist Hugo Leichtentritt

Hugo Leichtentritt

Hugo Leichtentritt was a German-Jewish musicologist and composer who spent much of his life in the USA. Composer Erich Walter Sternberg was one of his pupils.-Literary works:*R...

 (1874-1951). A fictional example of Chopin's harmonies with Bach's figuration and vice versa is given by British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 musicologist Jim Samson (born 1946). A harmonic reduction ("ground-melody") of the work can already be found in Czerny’s

Carl Czerny

Carl Czerny was an Austrian pianist, composer and teacher. He is best remembered today for his books of études for the piano. Czerny's music was profoundly influenced by his teachers, Muzio Clementi, Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Antonio Salieri and Ludwig van Beethoven.-Early life:Carl Czerny was born...

 School of Practical Composition.

The work is to be executed at an Allegro tempo. Chopin’s metronome marking, given in the original sources, is MM 176 referring to quarter notes

Quarter note

A quarter note or crotchet is a note played for one quarter of the duration of a whole note . Often people will say that a crotchet is one beat, however, this is not always correct, as the beat is indicated by the time signature of the music; a quarter note may or may not be the beat...

. The time-signature common time

Common Time

"Common Time" is a science fiction short story written by James Blish. It first appeared in the August 1953 issue of Science Fiction Quarterly and has been reprinted several times: in the 1959 short-story collection Galactic Cluster; in The Testament of Andros ; in The Penguin Science Fiction...

is according to the first French, English, and German editions. A copy by Józef Linowski of Chopin's autograph

Autograph

An autograph is a document transcribed entirely in the handwriting of its author, as opposed to a typeset document or one written by an amanuensis or a copyist; the meaning overlaps with that of the word holograph.Autograph also refers to a person's artistic signature...

 reads cut time (alla breve). A slower tempo (MM 152) has been suggested by later editors such as Hans von Bülow

Hans von Bülow

Hans Guido Freiherr von Bülow was a German conductor, virtuoso pianist, and composer of the Romantic era. He was one of the most famous conductors of the 19th century, and his activity was critical for establishing the successes of several major composers of the time, including Richard...

 who feared that at MM 176 "the majestic grandeur [would be] impaired." There is no Maestoso

Maestoso

Maestoso is an Italian musical term and is used to direct performers to play a certain passage of music in a stately, dignified and majestic fashion or, it is used to describe music as such. The term is commonly used in relatively slow pieces; however, there are numerous examples - such as the...

indication by Chopin though. Unlike the fourth étude of Opus 10

Étude Op. 10, No. 4 (Chopin)

Étude Op. 10, No. 4, in C-sharp minor, is a study for solo piano composed by Frédéric Chopin in 1830. It was first published in 1833 in France, Germany, and England as the fourth piece of his Études Op. 10...

, which reaches ƒƒƒ, this one stays in ƒ throughout and never once reaches ƒƒ. Both right hand arpeggios and left hand octaves are to be played legato

Legato

In musical notation the Italian word legato indicates that musical notes are played or sung smoothly and connected. That is, in transitioning from note to note, there should be no intervening silence...

 throughout.

Technical difficulties

Chopin’s pupil, Friederike Müller-Streicher (1816–1895), quotes Chopin:

"You shall benefit from this Etude. If you learn it according to my instructions it will expand your hand and enable you to perform arpeggio

Arpeggio

An arpeggio is a musical technique where notes in a chord are played or sung in sequence, one after the other, rather than ringing out simultaneously...

s like strokes of the [violin] bow

Bow (music)

In music, a bow is moved across some part of a musical instrument, causing vibration which the instrument emits as sound. The vast majority of bows are used with string instruments, although some bows are used with musical saws and other bowed idiophones....

. Unfortunately, instead of teaching, it frequently un-teaches everything."

In Schumann’s

Robert Schumann

Robert Schumann, sometimes known as Robert Alexander Schumann, was a German composer, aesthete and influential music critic. He is regarded as one of the greatest and most representative composers of the Romantic era....

 NZM

Neue Zeitschrift für Musik

Die Neue Zeitschrift für Musik was a music magazine published in Leipzig, co-founded by Robert Schumann, his teacher and future father-in law Friedrich Wieck, and his close friend Ludwig Schuncke...

 article on Pianoforte-Études, NZM (1836), the study is classified under the category "stretches: right hand" (Spannungen. Rechte Hand). The novelty of this étude is its broad right hand arpeggios in semiquavers

Sixteenth note

thumb|right|Figure 1. A sixteenth note with stem facing up, a sixteenth note with stem facing down, and a sixteenth rest.thumb|right|Figure 2. Four sixteenth notes beamed together....

 (sixteenth notes). These nonstop arpeggios, based mostly on chords of the tenth and covering up to six octave

Octave

In music, an octave is the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been referred to as the "basic miracle of music", the use of which is "common in most musical systems"...

s, surpass the drier octave arpeggios of earlier piano composers such as Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...

, Clementi

Muzio Clementi

Muzio Clementi was a celebrated composer, pianist, pedagogue, conductor, music publisher, editor, and piano manufacturer. Born in Italy, he spent most of his life in England. He is best known for his piano sonatas, and his collection of piano studies, Gradus ad Parnassum...

 or Czerny

Carl Czerny

Carl Czerny was an Austrian pianist, composer and teacher. He is best remembered today for his books of études for the piano. Czerny's music was profoundly influenced by his teachers, Muzio Clementi, Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Antonio Salieri and Ludwig van Beethoven.-Early life:Carl Czerny was born...

 in richness of overtones as well as in difficulty. The left hand plays a melody

Melody

A melody , also tune, voice, or line, is a linear succession of musical tones which is perceived as a single entity...

 in slow legato octaves

Octave

In music, an octave is the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been referred to as the "basic miracle of music", the use of which is "common in most musical systems"...

.

The main technical difficulty of this piece is playing the uninterrupted right hand arpeggios, including the swift position changes, in legato powerfully and accurately at the suggested tempo (quarter note equals 176) without straining the hand. The momentum

Momentum

In classical mechanics, linear momentum or translational momentum is the product of the mass and velocity of an object...

 of the motion

Motion (physics)

In physics, motion is a change in position of an object with respect to time. Change in action is the result of an unbalanced force. Motion is typically described in terms of velocity, acceleration, displacement and time . An object's velocity cannot change unless it is acted upon by a force, as...

 has to be transferred by the outer hand and the fifth finger to the accentuated top notes. French pianist Alfred Cortot

Alfred Cortot

Alfred Denis Cortot was a Franco-Swiss pianist and conductor. He is one of the most renowned 20th-century classical musicians, especially valued for his poetic insight in Romantic period piano works, particularly those of Chopin and Schumann.-Early life and education:Born in Nyon, Vaud, in the...

 (1877-1962) states that the first difficulty to overcome is "stretch and firmness in shifting the hand over nearly the whole length of the keyboard." Exercises introduced by Cortot, Gottfried Galston and Alfredo Casella

Alfredo Casella

Alfredo Casella was an Italian composer, pianist and conductor.- Life and career :Casella was born in Turin; his family included many musicians; his grandfather, a friend of Paganini's, was first cello in the San Carlo Theatre in Lisbon and eventually was soloist in the Royal Chapel in Turin...

 deal mostly with stretch and anticipation of position changes. Busoni

Ferruccio Busoni

Ferruccio Busoni was an Italian composer, pianist, editor, writer, piano and composition teacher, and conductor.-Biography:...

 in his Klavierübung

Klavierübung (Busoni)

The Klavierübung , by the Italian pianist-composer Ferruccio Busoni, is a compilation of piano exercises and practice pieces, including transcriptions of works by other composers and original compositions of his own....

  introduces an exercise for two hands in contrary motion, somewhat reminiscent of Godowsky

Leopold Godowsky

Leopold Godowsky was a famed Polish American pianist, composer, and teacher. One of the most highly regarded performers of his time, he became known for his theories concerning the application of relaxed weight and economy of motion in piano playing, principles later propagated by Godowsky's...

. Australian

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

 pianist Alan Kogosowski

Alan Kogosowski

-Biography:Alan Kogosowski was born in Melbourne. From the age of six he played the piano for ten hours a day. He won a number of competitions and prizes, including the Australian television talent quest "BP Showcase 1966"...

 warns against straining the right hand by constant overstretching. To avoid strain, the first note of the position "must be released like a hot potato," and the hand "should move quickly and laterally, without stretching, from the first note to the next note and the next position."

Paraphrases

Leopold Godowsky’s

Leopold Godowsky

Leopold Godowsky was a famed Polish American pianist, composer, and teacher. One of the most highly regarded performers of his time, he became known for his theories concerning the application of relaxed weight and economy of motion in piano playing, principles later propagated by Godowsky's...

 53 Studies on Chopin's Études

Studies on Chopin's Etudes

The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's études. The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's études. The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's...

include two versions. The first one arranges the sixteenth notes arpeggios for both hands in contrary motion and changes the time signature to 3/4. The second version in D-flat major gives two voices to be played entirely with the left hand alone. The time signature is 2 × 4/4.

Friedrich Wührer

Friedrich Wührer

Friedrich Wührer was an Austrian-German pianist and piano pedagogue. He was a close associate and advocate of composer Franz Schmidt, whose music he edited and, in the case of the works for left hand alone, revised for performance with two hands; he was also a champion of the Second Viennese...

 inverts the hands in his arrangement, giving the arpeggios to the left hand.

External links

• Analysis of Chopin Etudes at Chopin: the poet of the piano
• Chopin Etude Op. 10, No. 1 played by Claudio Arrau
  Claudio Arrau
  Claudio Arrau León was a Chilean pianist known for his interpretations of a vast repertoire spanning from the baroque to 20th-century composers, especially Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, Brahms and Debussy...
  
   (Youtube)
• Chopin Etude Op. 10, No. 1 played by Kristian Cvetkovic (Youtube)
• Chopin Etude Op. 10, No. 1 played by Valentina Lisitsa
  Valentina Lisitsa
  Valentina Lisitsa is a Ukrainian-born classical pianist. Lisitsa resides in North Carolina in the USA. Her husband, Alexei Kuznetsoff, is also a pianist and her partner in a number of piano duets.- Biography :Lisitsa was born in Kiev, Ukraine, in 1973...
  
   (Youtube)
• Chopin-Godowsky - Etude op. 10 No. 1 (1st version] played by Boris Berezovsky
  Boris Berezovsky (pianist)
  - Biography :Berezovsky studied at the Moscow Conservatory with Eliso Virsaladze and privately with Alexander Satz. Following his London début at the Wigmore Hall in 1988, The Times described him as "an artist of exceptional promise, a player of dazzling virtuosity and formidable power."In May 2005...
  
  , 2006 (Youtube)