Chopin: His Life and Works

Siepmann, Jeremy

4.12

158 ratings by Goodreads

9789626344569: Chopin: His Life and Works

ISBN 10: 9626344563 ISBN 13: 9789626344569

Publisher: Naxos Audio Books, 2010

In 2010, the 200th anniversary of the birth of Chopin is celebrated. Regarded as one of the most mesmerising performers of his day, Fr�d�ric Chopin, the pianist-composer, lives on in his music - his waltzes, mazurkas, etudes, preludes, nocturnes, three piano sonatas and two piano concertos. Here, his life, from his birth in Poland, his famous affair with the French writer George Sand, to his death at the age of 39 in Paris, is told with his music featuring prominently. We think of Chopin as a 'frail, sheltered genius' but this forthright portrait demonstrates he was far more boisterous than that. Cheerful as a youth, it was only later that the glare of publicity, the change from local to national celebrity, made Chopin guard his privacy more carefully. This is clearly presented in Jeremy Siepmann's sympathetic account of the life of one of the key figures in Romantic music.

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About the Author:

Though long resident in England, Jeremy Siepmann was born and formally educated in the United States. Despite a late start, he was encouraged by both Rudolf Serkin and Virgil Thomson to pursue a career in music. He studied in New York and later in London where he began teaching for the WEA and later for London University. For most of the last 20 years he has confined his teaching activity to the piano. As a writer he has contributed articles, reviews and interviews to numerous journals and reference works (including New Statesman, Gramophone, BBC Music Magazine and The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians), some of them being reprinted in book form (Oxford University Press, Robson Books). His books include a widely acclaimed biography of Chopin (The Reluctant Romantic, Gollancz, July '95), two volumes on the history and literature of the piano, and a biography of Brahms (Everyman/EMI, 1997). In December 1997 he was appointed editor of Piano magazine. His career as a broadcaster began in New York in 1963 with an East Coast radio series on the life and work of Mozart, described by Alistair Cooke as 'the best music program on American radio'. On the strength of this, improbably, he was hired by the BBC as a humorist, in which capacity he furnished weekly satirical items on various aspects of American life. After a long break he returned to broadcasting in 1977. Since 1979 he has devised, written and presented more than 1,000 programmes for BBC radio including the international-award-winning series 'The Elements of Music'. In 1988 he was appointed Head of Music at the BBC World Service, broadcasting to an estimated audience of 135 million. He left the Corporation in Spring 1994 to form his own independent production company.

From AudioFile:

This biography of Frederick Chopin, with commentary on his works, including beautifully played samples of the pieces under discussion, is to my mind a near perfect use of the audio format. Siepmann writes with acumen and sympathy about both the man and the music, and reads the narration with equal skill. When dialogue is taken verbatim from letters or journals, four skillful actors are used to bring long dead personalities to life and add texture to the narrative. My only wish would be for an audible signal to alert one that a side is finished. B.G. � AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine-- Copyright � AudioFile, Portland, Maine

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