Exploring Composition And Interpreting Performance Of Chopin's Ballades

Chopin,an outstanding composer and pianist during the Romantic period,occupies a rather high position in the history of Western music.He almost devoted his lifetime to the compositions by the musical instrument of piano;hence he is called "a Romantic poet of piano." Chopin was one of typical creators of Romantic musical language who could have original conceptions in musical language,and at the same time,continuously excavate and give play to the performing potential of the instrument of piano.He lifted many genres of music to a new space of composition,among which ballade is a representative;Chopin endowed ballades to a very high ideological level and with high artistic values.On the basis of documents,my own feelings when I studied and performed Chopin's ballades,together with videos of performance recording such pianists as Krystian Zimerman and Li Yundi,I had a comprehensive and deep study on Chopin's four ballades which were composed under the influences of Mickiewicz's narrative verses,about which I also had a detailed analysis from the angle of performance.The body of this paper is divided into two parts.Part one sketches Chopin's life,the establishment of the genre of ballades,and the composing characteristics of ballade,among which the composing characteristics are summarized as five aspects including meter,musical form structure,theme,basic features and Romanticism,and the color of tragedy.Part Two elaborates specifically the two aspects of music analysis and performance interpretation of the four ballades.It firstly provides brief introduction to each ballade that was influenced by one or two Mickiewicz's narrative verses,and then conducts musical analysis from such aspects as musical form structure,tonality,and melody.Moreover,the paper experiences in depth the ideological implications of the works from the perspective of performing skills:what kinds of performance can thoroughly and perfectly express the works' ideological connotations through fingers?This paper is expected to contribute to our understanding and performance of Chop in's ballades.