The OP didn't suggest otherwise.

I happen to agree that the Chopin Etudes are very good music, but we've already had a few including a conservatory student who feel differently so their musical worth has clearly been questioned and by some sophisticated pianists. These are their opinions.

Well of course they are, but in all my musical years -pre-univerity, university, post-university- (and I am admittedly younger than you are)- I have never, EVER heard any experienced musician who has not the highest regard for the Chopin etudes, and I talked to many in London. Most recently Randolph Hokanson, who is still going strong in Seattle at 97!

After a fabulous concert featuring the Mozart K310 (which he thinks the greatest), I asked him about the worth of the Chopin etudes (because I have been wrestling with the issue), he just smiled and nodded. My friend Rob was there too, and can back me up.

Arrogant of me, perhaps, impatience is not one of my better qualities, terribly un-Christian. But I look at what Chopin has accomplished, you might as well tell me that the 2nd act of 'Walkure' is not one of the tightest spans of time that Wagner ever conceived.

Surprised that I need to defend such incredible music.

Actually he did! (I missed it too.)

I do play the 8ve at the beginning, but take the first RH note with the LH thumb. It's already there, after all.

I'm a brother-in-arms with you in addition to your namesake here. I never thought the pure musical worth of Chopin's etudes was more suspect than other pillars of the literature.

The OP didn't suggest otherwise.

I think he did....

There are certainly many other sets of etudes from various composers and we may (or may not) prefer these to Opp. 10 and 25, but anyone questioning the worth of these sets simply doesn't know what they are talking about. Period.

They're valuable exercises just as Czerny op.299 is, no one is questioning that.

Maybe it's time you open your eyes to the world outside your own that doesn't consider most of these programmable pieces. There are a lot of people who would refuse to go to a concert to listen to a big name artist play a bunch of Chopin etudes rather than something more interesting which they would otherwise like to go see. I might not know what I'm talking about, but I'd like to think that people who graduated from Julliard and Moscow Conservatory and such would know what they're talking about.

Just cause you may not pay to listen to them performed doesn't reduce their musical value. I, and many others, wouldn't pay to listen to somebody play the Tchaikovsky piano concerto or the Schumann, because they've lost their freshness to me. Their place in music remains unchanged though.

Thanks for ignoring the point.

BTW: I never even thought about leaving out the middle notes in the LH chords of op 10/2. I tried that, and it's never sounded better! So far, the Chopin Police haven't busted down my door.

One of the best all-Chopin concerts I've attended in recent years was when Louis Lortie performed both sets of Etudes Op.10 & 25, plus the Trois nouvelles études

One of the best all-Chopin concerts I've attended in recent years was when Louis Lortie performed both sets of Etudes Op.10 & 25, plus the Trois nouvelles études which made up the novelty in his program.

Yes, that was one mind-blowing program.

I was joking with my colleague that Louis Lortie probably plays through that entire set every morning just to warm up.

^^ +1

There are 2 etudes that I don't mind hearing, and those are op.25 no.6 and op.25 no.11, but everything else I don't really want to listen to. I used to like listening to op.10 no.4 since I thought it was impressive, but since I can play that one pretty fast now (well, if I revive it) it no longer awes me when someone pulls it off at a very quick tempo.

What about op. 25-3? Such a cute little piece! Trifinov plays it best.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLZ4WJiDldU#t=4m45s

Actually his 2, 3, 4 and 5 are all very good (these happen to be my favorite of the etudes)

OK, you dragged it out of me.

All I need to do is say the first few notes, and you could figure out the rest. First of all I do what Thrill said and then on the next 4 notes (G-C-E-C) the RH does 1-2-4-2, then shifts up to play the next 4 notes the same way, and so on. Sometimes it's 1-3-5-3 or 1-2-5-2 or whatever, depending on how the notes lay out. And where you can't take the first RH note of a figure with the LH, you use 2 and then jump the thumb to the next note. (And BTW maybe sometimes you actually have to 'stretch' as much as an octave, don't remember for sure, glad to say I haven't done this stupid trick in years.)

It's a genuine felony.