I may risk repeating some now. In spite of your arrogance xtraheat you are a sensitive and lyrical performer, but let us start from the beginning. You started the largo beautifully, but there was almost no diminuendo. The opening is an exercise in tone control. It is HELLISHLY difficult to play properly. Don't be fooled by the simplicity of the notes. You were not convincing with the dotted, triplet rhythm in bar. Also be careful you count the rests. The soprano b flat bars 7/8 is a bridge and should resonate into the opening quavors of the moderato. Note the accent on the first not of each group of 5. This should be played louder than the melody notes. It is [effectively] a pedal note. Personally I play the moderato much faster, but I was deeply impressed with your lyricism here. I was equally impressed with bars 25 thru' 33. I am not sure you got the final accented soprano A & the was the odd stutter, but that was as good as anything I have heard taking that into account. Bar 34 was not so good, but at least you didn't smudge with the pedal.

The 'a tempo' needs to be played much more positively in my opinion, but the agitato was convincing. I know Argerich plays the sempre piu mosso at the speed of light. What you played was intense and jazzy but too fast in my opinion. You lose most of the subtlety, which is particularly intriguing in view of your slow moderato. What speed? Maybe 70% of the speed you played it and it should arc. I did not get the calando....smrozando. By then you should be almost down to nothing. Remember CHOPIN IS TONE!!!!!

Meno mosso was very nice, until you reach the "sempre pp" . I don't think I heard ANY of the accents. Those bars revolve around the accents, and where there aren't any accents they should be implied for rhythmic symmetry. The diminuendo e rallentando needs to be played much lighter. It is a quasi smorzando. Note the LACK OF ACCENT on the first note of the quavor groups from 'a tempo'. It is scored "sotto voce" because wants you to highlight the whole group. This leads to the big climax at cresc...fz...sempre cresc. Very nice performance right up to the group of 4 vs 3 cross rhythm (beautifully executed). Next bar was good with the well timed mordent, but what happened to the staccato quavors. I think that needs to be practiced in isolation. This is a pivot bar as though the following is scored ff, it really should be played fff. I am not sure your first mordent octave was sharp enough, but the runs were superb. Note the change of phrasing (slurs) in the left hand in the final one. Sadly the diminuendo really let your performance down. You need to go from 5th down to 1st gear in 2 bars. The rolled chord in the base should be "snapped" out. I would avoid the sustaining pedal as much as possible.. .maybe a dab here and there only.

Again you have been listening to too much Argerich (sorry for picking on you Martha). Xtraheat you cannot do what she does. The piu animato is not an opportunity for the performer to thrash the piano for all its worth (showing off), but a subtle development bridge to the scherzando. All your sensitivity went out of the window with the piu animato. It needs to begin much softer and slower. A gradual accelerando should be applied. I even play the piu vivo much slower, but at this point your performance is very convincing, so what you did was fine. WATCH THE POCO RIT! It must really slow down here. Chopin wants to surprise the listener. I play the scherzando much slower than you, but I found your interpretation dynamic, appealing and in my opinion in the spirit of the score, so I may try your approach in future. I am not sure you really understand the punctuation of the final bars and the leggiermente (lightly) was the equivalent of an elephant trampling the keys. You did not spike the fz in the final, which was well, unconvincing to say the least. I suggest you work on this in isolation. When you play it imagine you are ice skating. That should be the affect.

Not sure I heard an fz base b flat or followi ng section was played a uniform ff. Nicely played but you did not get the group of 5 grace note motif. It should be played as a group of 5 against 6 cross rhythm. The grace note is played as a semi-quavor. You need to work on bar preceding the con forza. The trill should be a good strong mordent and no ritenuto should be applied just because you cant play the tricky rhythm at speed. Onto the con forza. The triplet soprano should be punched out. I apply an accent on the first of the group of 5. This is in the spirit of the opening moderato. Indeed I apply an accent to the first of each cluster (i.e. accented quavor C flat of the group following E (flat) F and crotchet G. I also accent the jump octave B flats.

Again notice the meno mosso/sotto voce combination. Some nice development here. I was impressed, but what happened to the appassionato? You need to be clear on your rhythmic intentions. Plenty of cosmetic errors, but who cares? There was real fire in your presto con fuoco and as fuoco is fire, your interpretation was brilliant in my book. Keep it up. Beautifully punched out dotted left hand chord under the cromatic rising run leading to a disappointing first con forza. It was really a con fluff. You didn't spike the final G. What made it more annoying was you executed to 2nd far more difficult 10ths superbly. You did not quite get the grace note octaves, but all in all a very competent 'coda'.

Well done, your performance was an asset to this forum. N ow I am waiting for the "easier" 4th ballade.

Many people believe that whatever is the last version (or at least the last that has been found) is definitive; I don't, among other reasons because, what happens if we wind up finding yet another later edition?? Are we forever going to be ready to throw away what we always knew or felt about a piece because of some later version that gets found?

I agree with most things, but I don't see how anything he's said makes him "arrogant."

I don't see the logic here. If one truly feels the last edition is definitive (I'm certainly not saying I do), then the "last one" means the last one known at that point in time and one uses it. If a later version is found, one uses that.

IMO (and I know that many would say we can't have an "opinion" on something like this) those are just "serving suggestions." Just in the few days that I've been on this site, I've noticed it said a few times (correctly, I think) that Chopin's different manuscripts reflect different ideas that he had about a piece at different times -- and by extension, I think we can be pretty sure that he even had still other ideas at other times. Many people believe that whatever is the last version (or at least the last that has been found) is definitive; I don't, among other reasons because, what happens if we wind up finding yet another later edition?? Are we forever going to be ready to throw away what we always knew or felt about a piece because of some later version that gets found?

For another example similar example (on which I won't be on any more solid ground than in the Ballade): In the E major Scherzo, at the beginning of the 3rd page in the Schirmer Joseffy edition (sorry, don't have the measure number!), the rolled chord is indicated to be attacked in a pretty specific way. I haven't been able to make that execution "work," so I do it differently, with little self-consciousness. Many people would say that's just wrong; I say we don't know that Chopin himself even took it the indicated way most of the time.

Let me add also: There is so much about playing Chopin that is difficult and controversial, and much that we nowadays maybe just "don't get," that I think the issue of how we roll a chord is relatively insignificant. I don't mean we should stop talking and debating about it, just that it's probably not that a huge thing alongside all the rest. I'll take a sensitive and interesting performance with a "wrong" roll over a less interesting performance with a "correct" roll, any time.
I know that I'm sort of "beating a straw man" with that statement, because I'm pretty sure you'd take it too.

I know that's what many or most people think.
I don't get it.

For a composer like Beethoven, I would, because we know that he "worked things out" as he went along.
Do we know that about Chopin??? I think if anything we know that he didn't particularly, or at least that he also had alternate/parallel ways. A cliche about him -- and one which I think is pretty close to true -- is that he played his pieces differently each time. Was it an "evolution" toward something better, or just different? I think mainly the latter -- and it seems that most people agree on this part of my take on it, doesn't it? -- and I don't know that we have much reason to think the different editions (and the markings in his students' scores) reflect something other than the same thing as his playing the pieces differently at different times.

So, what I'm saying is that for Chopin, there's never (literally never, I think) any such thing as a "definitive" edition.

That's "the logic." I know that you disagree with it, but I hope you won't feel that you don't see it.

....
Let me guess: bar 89, where the RH has a repeated A sharp followed by a rising E, A sharp, E, and Joseffy says to hit the first A sharp with the bass, but you prefer to hit the second A sharp with the bass? So do I.......

I agree that it isn't always possible to be sure of a definitive reading of a particular Chopin work. However...
1) Most differences don't significantly affect the sound of the work to anyone but hard-core connoisseurs .....But there are notable exceptions that really stand out, such as whether to play E natural or E flat at the end of the 3rd bar of op.28 no.20. Bar 7 of op.23 is another exception: it's the first dissonance of a piece, highly exposed, at a very slow tempo, setting the tone for where the melody enters for the first time....

2) There's also a big difference between incidental points and fundamentals. Playing grace notes on the beat as the norm rather than the exception in Chopin is a fundamental stylistic point, confirmed repeatedly by the composer via his pupils, in pen, pencil, and testimony. It's not one of the "minutiae" type of differences between autographs and/or first editions.

There's an excellent book I've seen mentioned before in Pianist Corner ....Chopin: pianist and teacher as seen by his pupils by Jean-Jacques Eigeldinger .....It may change your opinions....