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Radio Chopin 14: Chopin Comes to America

Series: Radio Chopin
From: WDAV Classical Public Radio
Length: 00:02:00

...Chopin never made it to the New World. But the “Chopin of the Creoles” – American composer and pianist Louis Moreau Gottschalk – came to him. Read the full description.
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Piece Description

Chopin never made it to the New World.  But the “Chopin of the Creoles” – American composer and pianist Louis Moreau Gottschalk – came to him.   

Transcript

TEASE: [dry] In this edition of Radio Chopin: Chopin comes to America!

[start musicm - Gottschalk: The Banjo]

I’m Lisa Simeone. True, this isn’t Chopin’s music, and Chopin never made it to the New World. But the “Chopin of the Creoles” – American composer and pianist Louis Moreau Gottschalk – came to him.

Gottschalk was born to a Jewish-English father and a Creole mother in New Orleans, America’s hotbed of classical music in the day. When Gottschalk was 13, his father packed the young piano prodigy off to Paris to study at the world-famous Conservatoire…which at first REJECTED his application, his examiner declaring, “America is a country of steam engines.”

But Gottschalk chugged through and by 1845, he was making his Paris debut at the Salle Pleyel. On the program: Chopin’s Piano Concerto in E minor. In the audience: The composer himself.

[Rondo from PC 1 – find a...
Read the full transcript

Musical Works

Title Artist Album Label Year Length
Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 1 in E Minor (iii. Rondo) Emmanuel Ax, restored 1851 Erard piano; Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment; Sir Charles Mackerras, conductor 00:00

Additional Credits

Lisa Simeone, host
Benjamin K. Roe, executive producer

Related Website

www.radiochopin.org