This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 5 | ← | Archive 8 | Archive 9 | Archive 10 | Archive 11 | Archive 12 | → | Archive 15 |
There has been a great tendency in the above discussion to digress into many off-topic issues (by myself included). Let's refocus on the issue of Chopin's ethnicity, or if you prefer nationality. That will be the only way that some consensus can be reached here. Chopin is a national hero in Poland, much in the same way that Lord Byron is a national hero to the Greeks. The difference being that Byron is only of British ethnicity and Chopin is both French and Polish. This nonsense about you are what you think you are, didn't make Idi Amin "King of Scotland". Is anyone able to explain how or why Chopin loses his French paternity to an eraser (or in modern times with the delete button)? That would be helpful. Dr. Dan ( talk) 00:46, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
"Original research": what a great excuse used to repudiate a valid argument!
Here are some " mythical" documents:
Found at paragraph 2 of the above under the heading L’ÉVOLUTION HISTORIQUE DU DROIT FRANÇAIS DE LA NATIONALITÉ
-- Frania W. ( talk) 18:17, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
Atwardow, here is an interesting find [1] to compare with your comments: "It seems a little baffling that one country can simply pass a law and declare that an indiscriminate number of people anywhere in the world and for all perpetuity are going to be nationals of that country whether they like it or not..." & "By the way, I find it absolutely bewildering that a consistent application of your interpretation of this problem would lead you to assign nationalities to a bunch of people who probably wouldn't feel the same way about it." It would seem that, at least on nationality, modern Poland has adopted (or kept) the French Napoleonic Code of 1804:
POLOGNE (mis à jour le 17.09.2004) 1. Dispositions législatives sur la nationalité a. Textes en vigueur - Loi du 15 février 1962 sur la citoyenneté polonaise (Journal officiel/Dziennik Ustaw n° 28, 2000, point 323 et amendements). Traduction en langue anglaise disponible.
4. Droit du sang (Jus sanguinis) Depuis 1920, le droit polonais reconnaît le principe de l’acquisition de la nationalité polonaise du fait d’être né de parents polonais (droit du sang). Un enfant né de parents qui ont la nationalité polonaise acquiert donc cette nationalité quel que soit le pays dans lequel il est né. Le droit polonais reconnaît aux parents le droit de donner à leur enfant la nationalité d’un autre Etat lorsque l’un des deux parents est polonais et l’autre ressortissant d’un autre Etat. Les parents peuvent opter pour une nationalité étrangère dans les trois mois suivants la naissance de l’enfant.
I apologize for sending this in French, but if you are a Pole, I am sure you can find this in the Civil Code of Poland which you seem to know by heart.
Regards, -- Frania W. ( talk) 18:46, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
I've seen all of these documents before. Yes, I've seen Chopin's certificate of baptism which took place in Poland. You claim that the existing laws may have offered him automatic French citizenship (which is itself contradicted by other sources I've provided which assert that he had to apply for citizenship), but this changes nothing about his nationality. Chopin was born in (some political variant of) Poland, spoke Polish as his first language, left Poland because of political developments, etc. I don't care if the Code de Napoleon or whatever claimed his a Frenchman. This assertion is utterly meaningless because Frederic Chopin wasn't born in France, so he wasn't a Frenchman. France claiming him as a Frenchman is as meaningless as Russia claiming him as a Russian because Poland was at some point during his life in Poland incorporated into the Russian Empire. Was he a Russian national because the laws of Russia claimed him as a Russian citizen? Should the lead read "Chopin was a French-Russian composer of the Romantic Era?" With that example you see how absurd the whole situation becomes. Chopin regarded himself as a "Pole" (see an above quotation I provided). He did not regard himself as a Frenchman, so France's desire to make him a Frenchman will simply not suffice.-- Atwardow ( talk) 21:23, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
(OD) Atwardow, thank you for your input here. If it's any comfort to know this, I have no plans to "railroad" my understanding of the facts into the article, without a general consensus first. It would be of great benefit to hear other viewpoints concerning the matter. Regarding your belief "I do think that it is important to take an individual's personal views regarding his own nationality into consideration" you may be surprised to know that I do not completely disagree with that premise. Only with the idea that the personal views of the individual could negate the reality of their nationality. Bluntly put, if a person was Jewish, but didn't want to be Jewish, and said they weren't Jewish, does that make them not Jewish? I happen to think not. As for Chopin, I see no evidence that he called himself Polish, or French, or Polish-French. Not everybody has such a need. More importantly, I see no evidence that Chopin, communicating in letters with his family in French, had some reason to deny the French aspect of his heritage. As for the question "why did Cyprian Norwid announce to the world that a Pole had left this world" , rather than a Frenchman left this world, I don't think a lot of effort is necessary to answer that question. Like you, I have other obligations, and best think that others should weigh in on this matter for now. I enjoyed the interaction with you because of your intelligence and reasonableness. Best wishes. Dr. Dan ( talk) 16:36, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
As usual, I thank you for your interesting thoughts and I may come back in some time and admit that you've changed my perspective. I'll "chew on it" for a while. You and Frania definitely had a lot of thought-provoking ideas. And who's to say we should live our lives without changing our mind at least sometimes? I hope some consensus will be reached at some point, I'll be more than open to hearing other views. But I also appreciated the interaction. -- Atwardow ( talk) 18:15, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
It seems to me that Chopins site has been a victim to polish editors that wanted to make sure Chopin is portrayed as a polish patriot on wikipedia. Here just some of the most ridiculous quotes: "The Polish spirit, culture and language pervaded the Chopins' home, and as a result the son would never, even in Paris, perfectly master the French language." It's obvious that someone wanted to make sure he would not be considered french by anyone - the source being a polish historian that is unknown beyond polish borders.
And here yet another quote: "Chopin at every step demonstrated his Polish spirit [...]" claimed by the same polish historian, Jachimecki.
"he was one of the first composers to clearly express nationalism through his music." the claim coming from Chopins "Mazurkas", which are basically unknown to the world - aside from the english wikipedia there is an article about them in the polish wikipedia alone.
"Though an ardent Polish patriot, in France he used the French versions of his given names and traveled on a French passport [...]"
All sources cited to prove these claims are mostly based on either polish historians or unknown ones. Just take a look "Delfina Potocka" his supposed muse and love - the single source of her article is the polish encyclopedia.
It is a disgrace that this article is being abused by nationalists. His polish heritage should be mentioned, but right now it is highly exaggerated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.89.209.115 ( talk) 07:49, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
This article is currently quite difficult to read because of all the cluttery and irrelevant images that crowd out the text and force the reader's eye to snake around the various irrelevant impediments in order to follow the sinuous line of copy. About a year ago I moved, reduced the size of, and judiciously re-located the already sizeable number of images in the article, but now the number of images has grown by leaps and bounds and the images have been enlarged and strewn about with no care towards readability.
The article does not need, and should not contain, images of every place that Chopin ever slept or visited, every museum or monument or plaque, and every person he ever studied with or was related to, MUCH LESS the friends of his in-laws!
The purpose of the article, as with any article in any encyclopedia, is to impart information, not to obscure it with a forest of irrelevant images.
Forgive this outburst; I'm simply frustrated at this problem, because it's a lengthy problem to solve, and I don't have the time to do so right now.
Let us take a lesson from the Chopin article in Spanish Wikipedia, which is a Featured Article on that site, and confine ourselves to no more images than they have: http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chopin Softlavender ( talk) 07:24, 29 September 2010 (UTC)
As may have been predicted. editors are trying to clutter the article back up with images. I'd like to set a few guidelines to prevent this:
(1) There's absolutely no reason that I can think of to have images of Chopin's parents. This only clutters the article, and I have no knowledge of any other biographcial article containing images of the subjects parents. Their images belong on articles about them.
(2) There is not reason to have an image of somewhere Chopin stayed less than 5 years. There's not even a really good reason to have an image of the house he was born in, although I suppose for sentimental reasons it can stay in.
(3) Images must not face each other with text in-between. The purpose of Wikipedia is to impart knowledge. It's hard to read when the text is crowded between images. This, again, is commn sense, and was posted above.
(4) Please do not add any more images to the article. If anything, remove more or, if you must, substitute something better. The Spanish article, which is an FA, has only 20, expertly placed, and the media files are also nicely consolidated and aligned.
Softlavender ( talk) 07:32, 13 October 2010 (UTC)
The following recently added material was immediately deleted from the section on the Etudes as a copyvio:
The great majority of Chopin's compositions were written for the piano as solo instrument; all of his extant works feature the piano in one way or another. They are technically demanding, but emphasize nuance and expressive depth. Chopin invented musical forms such as the instrumental ballade, and made major innovations in the piano sonata, mazurka, waltz, nocturne, polonaise, étude, impromptu and prélude.
Chopin's first set of studies entitled Douze Grandes Études, Op.10, was composed from 1828-1832, published in June 1833 and dedicated to Liszt. The second set, Douze Grandes Études, Op.25, was composed from 1833-1836, published in 1837 and dedicated to the Countess Marie d’Agôult.
In October 1829 Chopin wrote to his friend Titus Woyciechowski, "I have composed a grand study in my own manner." Those last four words provide some insight into the originality of Chopin's style: the man and his music being inseparable.
The basic character and purpose of old stereotyped keyboard exercises and studies were principally didactic. To the young Chopin of eighteen existing exercises and studies were not sufficient to conquer all of the technical and musical demands his compositions presented. Within the year Chopin produced his first composition that would ultimately form part of Op.10 and had created a new genre -the 'grande étude'. Numbers 8-11 were first to be completed, originally numbered 7-10, and by 1831, when Chopin arrived in Paris, all but numbers 3 and 4 had been completed.
There is a hint of irony in Chopin’s typically modest choice of genre title. His études undeniably illustrate the importance Chopin placed on the art of touch and the cultivation of it beyond the acquisition of virtuosity, revealing an infinite variety of tone-colour and textural contrast. Each étude is as much a study in expression and emotional dynamic as pure technique. The extreme technical demands being only ‘a means to an end’.
Chopin's études are the perfect synthesis of art and technique - far transcending the basic didactic purposes of dealing with a principal technical difficulty. They present a formidable challenge to pianists and with few exceptions exhaust all technical and musical possibilities: exceptions being the ‘orchestral’ effects of tremolos and broken octaves, which held no interest for Chopin. His supreme mastery as a composer of works of the highest art is amply demonstrated in these magnificent compositions and provided early confirmation of Chopin’s creative genius. Chopin was more concerned with the quality of tone and how music is performed, than with piano exercises for finger dexterity and development of the high finger striking techniques, requesting his pupils to stroke or caress the keys – “.. mould the keyboard as if with a velvet hand and feel the key rather than striking it!”. [Chopin Pianist and Teacher: Eigeldinger] Technique is essential as a basis to the music, but should remain subordinate to the music itself. As Schumann commented, “.. no-one should dare to be a poor musician in order to become a fine virtuoso.” [Neue Zeitschrift (14) 1841]
The deleting editor tagged the material as a copyright violation from http://chopinfound.brinkster.net/ip.asp?op=GrandEtudes. However (I just noticed), since the user who added it, User:Adlear, is clearly the author of the original material (Angela Lear), if she wants to post this on Wikipedia, that is her prerogative, right?, if it is accurate and verifiable and not OR. So we may want to add it back in, perhaps in a truncated or modified version. Anyway, I haven't actually read the material. Also, I notice that the submitting user has only made this one contribution to Wikipedia, which does make it somewhat suspect. But if there's a kernel of useful information in there and she gives free usage, perhaps that bit could be used. Softlavender ( talk) 09:56, 12 October 2010 (UTC)
This is a reminder to all editors that they need to fill out edit summaries for each edit. Thank you. Softlavender ( talk) 07:40, 30 October 2010 (UTC)
This is not done in any other biography that I've seen on Wikipedia. Parentage belongs in the body text of the article, not in the lead.
Also the lead should not give precise birth-village data. That's far too fine a detail for the lead. Please see WP:LEAD for full details on how the lead should read. In short: "The lead should define the topic and summarize the body of the article with appropriate weight."
For good examples of how an expat's nationality is handled in the lead of a couple of other articles, see: Henry James and T.S. Eliot. In other words, just state the facts. Chopin was a Pole who expatriated to France and lived there for the rest of his life. End of story. No need for debate or for nationality wars.
The lead should be much more about his music, its nature and importance, and his influence on music. Softlavender ( talk) 12:09, 1 November 2010 (UTC)
Reading the above thread concerning "parentage", etc. puts me into a déjà vu conundrum. Perhaps some of the newcomers to this discussion should read the archives of this entire talk page concerning what I believe to be the heart of the matter, namely ethnicity. That is, Chopin's ethnicity. The WP articles on citizenship and nationality aren't bad primers either. As pointed out, the opening line concerning "parentage" was hammered out in May in an effort to reach a consensus. Although I went along, I disagree that it was the best option, yet do agree that it is awkward and doesn't belong there. So Gregory and Softlavender what's the short version of your objection to calling Chopin a "French-Polish" composer? Dr. Dan ( talk) 16:42, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
(OD) How does the standard of living that Chopin enjoyed while living in Paris (at the Place Vendôme), or who paid for it, have anything to do with his ethnicity, which is supposedly what this is all about? Dr. Dan ( talk) 18:16, 3 November 2010 (UTC)
Furthermore how does the fact that the multi-millionaire and former Foreign Minister of Imperial Russia who bought a hotel in Paris which attracted people who shared linguistic and cultural associations change Chopin's ethnicity? I think by now it's pretty clear no one is denying the Polish component of that reality. Only the French component of his ethnicity. As for popular musical references claiming one thing and respected encyclopedias [5] claiming another, that's the way it goes. Dr. Dan ( talk) 14:53, 4 November 2010 (UTC)
(OD) As I said at the beginning of this thread, it's a "Déjà vu" situation. Lot's of banter, but no answers to some pertinent questions concerning Chopin. First, how the Hotel Lambert proves anything that detracts from Chopin's paternal ancestry, which was French, or Chopin's ethnicity which was half-French. Secondly, how the standard of living that Chopin enjoyed (owning a cabriolet and white gloves) has anything to do with his ethnicity. The only thing I got out of all of it was that there are people living in Silesia, who do not speak German, know no German relative (sic), but have German citizenship, and have two or three passports [8] (because someday it may prove to be useful). Sounds like the situation in Šalčininkai (someday it might prove to be useful to some people living there). Btw, if any of these people, one day, have an article about them on Wikipedia, we can worry about what they should be called at that time. Dr. Dan ( talk) 16:14, 5 November 2010 (UTC)
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 5 | ← | Archive 8 | Archive 9 | Archive 10 | Archive 11 | Archive 12 | → | Archive 15 |
There has been a great tendency in the above discussion to digress into many off-topic issues (by myself included). Let's refocus on the issue of Chopin's ethnicity, or if you prefer nationality. That will be the only way that some consensus can be reached here. Chopin is a national hero in Poland, much in the same way that Lord Byron is a national hero to the Greeks. The difference being that Byron is only of British ethnicity and Chopin is both French and Polish. This nonsense about you are what you think you are, didn't make Idi Amin "King of Scotland". Is anyone able to explain how or why Chopin loses his French paternity to an eraser (or in modern times with the delete button)? That would be helpful. Dr. Dan ( talk) 00:46, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
"Original research": what a great excuse used to repudiate a valid argument!
Here are some " mythical" documents:
Found at paragraph 2 of the above under the heading L’ÉVOLUTION HISTORIQUE DU DROIT FRANÇAIS DE LA NATIONALITÉ
-- Frania W. ( talk) 18:17, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
Atwardow, here is an interesting find [1] to compare with your comments: "It seems a little baffling that one country can simply pass a law and declare that an indiscriminate number of people anywhere in the world and for all perpetuity are going to be nationals of that country whether they like it or not..." & "By the way, I find it absolutely bewildering that a consistent application of your interpretation of this problem would lead you to assign nationalities to a bunch of people who probably wouldn't feel the same way about it." It would seem that, at least on nationality, modern Poland has adopted (or kept) the French Napoleonic Code of 1804:
POLOGNE (mis à jour le 17.09.2004) 1. Dispositions législatives sur la nationalité a. Textes en vigueur - Loi du 15 février 1962 sur la citoyenneté polonaise (Journal officiel/Dziennik Ustaw n° 28, 2000, point 323 et amendements). Traduction en langue anglaise disponible.
4. Droit du sang (Jus sanguinis) Depuis 1920, le droit polonais reconnaît le principe de l’acquisition de la nationalité polonaise du fait d’être né de parents polonais (droit du sang). Un enfant né de parents qui ont la nationalité polonaise acquiert donc cette nationalité quel que soit le pays dans lequel il est né. Le droit polonais reconnaît aux parents le droit de donner à leur enfant la nationalité d’un autre Etat lorsque l’un des deux parents est polonais et l’autre ressortissant d’un autre Etat. Les parents peuvent opter pour une nationalité étrangère dans les trois mois suivants la naissance de l’enfant.
I apologize for sending this in French, but if you are a Pole, I am sure you can find this in the Civil Code of Poland which you seem to know by heart.
Regards, -- Frania W. ( talk) 18:46, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
I've seen all of these documents before. Yes, I've seen Chopin's certificate of baptism which took place in Poland. You claim that the existing laws may have offered him automatic French citizenship (which is itself contradicted by other sources I've provided which assert that he had to apply for citizenship), but this changes nothing about his nationality. Chopin was born in (some political variant of) Poland, spoke Polish as his first language, left Poland because of political developments, etc. I don't care if the Code de Napoleon or whatever claimed his a Frenchman. This assertion is utterly meaningless because Frederic Chopin wasn't born in France, so he wasn't a Frenchman. France claiming him as a Frenchman is as meaningless as Russia claiming him as a Russian because Poland was at some point during his life in Poland incorporated into the Russian Empire. Was he a Russian national because the laws of Russia claimed him as a Russian citizen? Should the lead read "Chopin was a French-Russian composer of the Romantic Era?" With that example you see how absurd the whole situation becomes. Chopin regarded himself as a "Pole" (see an above quotation I provided). He did not regard himself as a Frenchman, so France's desire to make him a Frenchman will simply not suffice.-- Atwardow ( talk) 21:23, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
(OD) Atwardow, thank you for your input here. If it's any comfort to know this, I have no plans to "railroad" my understanding of the facts into the article, without a general consensus first. It would be of great benefit to hear other viewpoints concerning the matter. Regarding your belief "I do think that it is important to take an individual's personal views regarding his own nationality into consideration" you may be surprised to know that I do not completely disagree with that premise. Only with the idea that the personal views of the individual could negate the reality of their nationality. Bluntly put, if a person was Jewish, but didn't want to be Jewish, and said they weren't Jewish, does that make them not Jewish? I happen to think not. As for Chopin, I see no evidence that he called himself Polish, or French, or Polish-French. Not everybody has such a need. More importantly, I see no evidence that Chopin, communicating in letters with his family in French, had some reason to deny the French aspect of his heritage. As for the question "why did Cyprian Norwid announce to the world that a Pole had left this world" , rather than a Frenchman left this world, I don't think a lot of effort is necessary to answer that question. Like you, I have other obligations, and best think that others should weigh in on this matter for now. I enjoyed the interaction with you because of your intelligence and reasonableness. Best wishes. Dr. Dan ( talk) 16:36, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
As usual, I thank you for your interesting thoughts and I may come back in some time and admit that you've changed my perspective. I'll "chew on it" for a while. You and Frania definitely had a lot of thought-provoking ideas. And who's to say we should live our lives without changing our mind at least sometimes? I hope some consensus will be reached at some point, I'll be more than open to hearing other views. But I also appreciated the interaction. -- Atwardow ( talk) 18:15, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
It seems to me that Chopins site has been a victim to polish editors that wanted to make sure Chopin is portrayed as a polish patriot on wikipedia. Here just some of the most ridiculous quotes: "The Polish spirit, culture and language pervaded the Chopins' home, and as a result the son would never, even in Paris, perfectly master the French language." It's obvious that someone wanted to make sure he would not be considered french by anyone - the source being a polish historian that is unknown beyond polish borders.
And here yet another quote: "Chopin at every step demonstrated his Polish spirit [...]" claimed by the same polish historian, Jachimecki.
"he was one of the first composers to clearly express nationalism through his music." the claim coming from Chopins "Mazurkas", which are basically unknown to the world - aside from the english wikipedia there is an article about them in the polish wikipedia alone.
"Though an ardent Polish patriot, in France he used the French versions of his given names and traveled on a French passport [...]"
All sources cited to prove these claims are mostly based on either polish historians or unknown ones. Just take a look "Delfina Potocka" his supposed muse and love - the single source of her article is the polish encyclopedia.
It is a disgrace that this article is being abused by nationalists. His polish heritage should be mentioned, but right now it is highly exaggerated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.89.209.115 ( talk) 07:49, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
This article is currently quite difficult to read because of all the cluttery and irrelevant images that crowd out the text and force the reader's eye to snake around the various irrelevant impediments in order to follow the sinuous line of copy. About a year ago I moved, reduced the size of, and judiciously re-located the already sizeable number of images in the article, but now the number of images has grown by leaps and bounds and the images have been enlarged and strewn about with no care towards readability.
The article does not need, and should not contain, images of every place that Chopin ever slept or visited, every museum or monument or plaque, and every person he ever studied with or was related to, MUCH LESS the friends of his in-laws!
The purpose of the article, as with any article in any encyclopedia, is to impart information, not to obscure it with a forest of irrelevant images.
Forgive this outburst; I'm simply frustrated at this problem, because it's a lengthy problem to solve, and I don't have the time to do so right now.
Let us take a lesson from the Chopin article in Spanish Wikipedia, which is a Featured Article on that site, and confine ourselves to no more images than they have: http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chopin Softlavender ( talk) 07:24, 29 September 2010 (UTC)
As may have been predicted. editors are trying to clutter the article back up with images. I'd like to set a few guidelines to prevent this:
(1) There's absolutely no reason that I can think of to have images of Chopin's parents. This only clutters the article, and I have no knowledge of any other biographcial article containing images of the subjects parents. Their images belong on articles about them.
(2) There is not reason to have an image of somewhere Chopin stayed less than 5 years. There's not even a really good reason to have an image of the house he was born in, although I suppose for sentimental reasons it can stay in.
(3) Images must not face each other with text in-between. The purpose of Wikipedia is to impart knowledge. It's hard to read when the text is crowded between images. This, again, is commn sense, and was posted above.
(4) Please do not add any more images to the article. If anything, remove more or, if you must, substitute something better. The Spanish article, which is an FA, has only 20, expertly placed, and the media files are also nicely consolidated and aligned.
Softlavender ( talk) 07:32, 13 October 2010 (UTC)
The following recently added material was immediately deleted from the section on the Etudes as a copyvio:
The great majority of Chopin's compositions were written for the piano as solo instrument; all of his extant works feature the piano in one way or another. They are technically demanding, but emphasize nuance and expressive depth. Chopin invented musical forms such as the instrumental ballade, and made major innovations in the piano sonata, mazurka, waltz, nocturne, polonaise, étude, impromptu and prélude.
Chopin's first set of studies entitled Douze Grandes Études, Op.10, was composed from 1828-1832, published in June 1833 and dedicated to Liszt. The second set, Douze Grandes Études, Op.25, was composed from 1833-1836, published in 1837 and dedicated to the Countess Marie d’Agôult.
In October 1829 Chopin wrote to his friend Titus Woyciechowski, "I have composed a grand study in my own manner." Those last four words provide some insight into the originality of Chopin's style: the man and his music being inseparable.
The basic character and purpose of old stereotyped keyboard exercises and studies were principally didactic. To the young Chopin of eighteen existing exercises and studies were not sufficient to conquer all of the technical and musical demands his compositions presented. Within the year Chopin produced his first composition that would ultimately form part of Op.10 and had created a new genre -the 'grande étude'. Numbers 8-11 were first to be completed, originally numbered 7-10, and by 1831, when Chopin arrived in Paris, all but numbers 3 and 4 had been completed.
There is a hint of irony in Chopin’s typically modest choice of genre title. His études undeniably illustrate the importance Chopin placed on the art of touch and the cultivation of it beyond the acquisition of virtuosity, revealing an infinite variety of tone-colour and textural contrast. Each étude is as much a study in expression and emotional dynamic as pure technique. The extreme technical demands being only ‘a means to an end’.
Chopin's études are the perfect synthesis of art and technique - far transcending the basic didactic purposes of dealing with a principal technical difficulty. They present a formidable challenge to pianists and with few exceptions exhaust all technical and musical possibilities: exceptions being the ‘orchestral’ effects of tremolos and broken octaves, which held no interest for Chopin. His supreme mastery as a composer of works of the highest art is amply demonstrated in these magnificent compositions and provided early confirmation of Chopin’s creative genius. Chopin was more concerned with the quality of tone and how music is performed, than with piano exercises for finger dexterity and development of the high finger striking techniques, requesting his pupils to stroke or caress the keys – “.. mould the keyboard as if with a velvet hand and feel the key rather than striking it!”. [Chopin Pianist and Teacher: Eigeldinger] Technique is essential as a basis to the music, but should remain subordinate to the music itself. As Schumann commented, “.. no-one should dare to be a poor musician in order to become a fine virtuoso.” [Neue Zeitschrift (14) 1841]
The deleting editor tagged the material as a copyright violation from http://chopinfound.brinkster.net/ip.asp?op=GrandEtudes. However (I just noticed), since the user who added it, User:Adlear, is clearly the author of the original material (Angela Lear), if she wants to post this on Wikipedia, that is her prerogative, right?, if it is accurate and verifiable and not OR. So we may want to add it back in, perhaps in a truncated or modified version. Anyway, I haven't actually read the material. Also, I notice that the submitting user has only made this one contribution to Wikipedia, which does make it somewhat suspect. But if there's a kernel of useful information in there and she gives free usage, perhaps that bit could be used. Softlavender ( talk) 09:56, 12 October 2010 (UTC)
This is a reminder to all editors that they need to fill out edit summaries for each edit. Thank you. Softlavender ( talk) 07:40, 30 October 2010 (UTC)
This is not done in any other biography that I've seen on Wikipedia. Parentage belongs in the body text of the article, not in the lead.
Also the lead should not give precise birth-village data. That's far too fine a detail for the lead. Please see WP:LEAD for full details on how the lead should read. In short: "The lead should define the topic and summarize the body of the article with appropriate weight."
For good examples of how an expat's nationality is handled in the lead of a couple of other articles, see: Henry James and T.S. Eliot. In other words, just state the facts. Chopin was a Pole who expatriated to France and lived there for the rest of his life. End of story. No need for debate or for nationality wars.
The lead should be much more about his music, its nature and importance, and his influence on music. Softlavender ( talk) 12:09, 1 November 2010 (UTC)
Reading the above thread concerning "parentage", etc. puts me into a déjà vu conundrum. Perhaps some of the newcomers to this discussion should read the archives of this entire talk page concerning what I believe to be the heart of the matter, namely ethnicity. That is, Chopin's ethnicity. The WP articles on citizenship and nationality aren't bad primers either. As pointed out, the opening line concerning "parentage" was hammered out in May in an effort to reach a consensus. Although I went along, I disagree that it was the best option, yet do agree that it is awkward and doesn't belong there. So Gregory and Softlavender what's the short version of your objection to calling Chopin a "French-Polish" composer? Dr. Dan ( talk) 16:42, 2 November 2010 (UTC)
(OD) How does the standard of living that Chopin enjoyed while living in Paris (at the Place Vendôme), or who paid for it, have anything to do with his ethnicity, which is supposedly what this is all about? Dr. Dan ( talk) 18:16, 3 November 2010 (UTC)
Furthermore how does the fact that the multi-millionaire and former Foreign Minister of Imperial Russia who bought a hotel in Paris which attracted people who shared linguistic and cultural associations change Chopin's ethnicity? I think by now it's pretty clear no one is denying the Polish component of that reality. Only the French component of his ethnicity. As for popular musical references claiming one thing and respected encyclopedias [5] claiming another, that's the way it goes. Dr. Dan ( talk) 14:53, 4 November 2010 (UTC)
(OD) As I said at the beginning of this thread, it's a "Déjà vu" situation. Lot's of banter, but no answers to some pertinent questions concerning Chopin. First, how the Hotel Lambert proves anything that detracts from Chopin's paternal ancestry, which was French, or Chopin's ethnicity which was half-French. Secondly, how the standard of living that Chopin enjoyed (owning a cabriolet and white gloves) has anything to do with his ethnicity. The only thing I got out of all of it was that there are people living in Silesia, who do not speak German, know no German relative (sic), but have German citizenship, and have two or three passports [8] (because someday it may prove to be useful). Sounds like the situation in Šalčininkai (someday it might prove to be useful to some people living there). Btw, if any of these people, one day, have an article about them on Wikipedia, we can worry about what they should be called at that time. Dr. Dan ( talk) 16:14, 5 November 2010 (UTC)