Chopin 24 Preludes Study

Chopin is the representative of romantic music in the 19th century. His creation, involving the various genre of piano music, and also his contribution in the nocturne, etudes, prelude and so on, is a ground-making creation. It can be said like this "Where is piano, there is Chopin ".【1】The "24 preludes" was created in 1836-1839, from the history development of prelude, this creation has played a very important role in inheriting past traditions and breaking new grounds for the future. Among all the Chopin's piano works, it embodies the writing style of Chopin's piano music. It can represent the essence of Chopin's piano works creation. This thesis bases on the musical expression, music style and content characteristic of "24 preludes", and tries to study the content and the basic characteristics of it in order to show the profound musical mind and spirit, and highlight its artistic charm.This paper has five chapters:The first chapter: Overview of Chopin's Life and Creation PathChapter 2: This chapter is divided into two sections. In the first section, a brief introduction of origin and history development of prelude with the purpose of highlighting Chopin's important role in developing prelude genre. In the second section, this paper hopes to show its delicate musical style by introducing the content of "24 preludes".Chapter 3: Ontological Inquiry of 24 Preludes. It analyzes tonality, harmony and rhythm of"24 preludes" in order to show the outstanding talent of the writer.Chapter 4: Anatomy of 24 Preludes. This chapter contains three sections. The first section interprets the title and the second section explains the prelude of its drama. The third section is the innovation part of this thesis for putting forward the pioneering view; this section also is the key part of the whole.Chapter 5: Suggestion to Play 24 Preludes. In this chapter, the unique"rubato"in Chopin's works, the timbre and playing techniques were discussed.