CHOPIN 
          Nocturnes 
          (Complete) 
           VoL 1 
         Idil Biret, Piano 
     Fryderyk Chopin (1 810 - 1849) 
     Nocturne in B Flat Minor, Op. 9,  No. 1 
     Nocturne in E Flat Major, Op. 9, No. 2 
     Nocturne in B Major, Op. 9,  No. 3 
     Nocturne in F Major, Op. 15, No. 1 
     Nocturne in F Sharp Major, Op. 15, No. 2 
     Nocturne in G Minor, Op. 15, No. 3 
     Nocturne in C Sharp Minor, Op. 27,  No. 1 
     Nocturne in D Flat Major, Op. 27, No. 2 
     Nocturne in B Major, Op. 32, No. 1 
     Nocturne in A Flat Major, Op. 32, No. 2 
     Nocturne in C Minor, B.I.  108 
     Nocturne in C Sharp Minor, B.I.  49 
      The son of a French emigre of relatively humble origin, who had established 
     himself as a schoolmaster in Warsaw and espoused the cause of Poland with 
              Chopin was to make his home and career in Paris, after 
     enthusiasm, Fryderyk 
     early success at home, where he was trained at the Conservatory and gave a 
     series of  public concerts before trying his luck in Vienna.  Paris, however, 
     proved more suitable for his particular talents.  As a pianist he excelled in a 
     peculiar delicacy of nuance, while as a teacher and as a gentleman he proved 
     acceptable in the elegant salons of the French capital. 
              Chopin enjoyed or occasionally suffered a relationship 
      For some ten years 
    with the strong-willed blue-stocking Aurore Dudevant, better known by her 
     pen-name of George Sand, a woman of a distinctly liberated cast of mind, who 
    was to find even in her inamorato a source for her own fiction. Chopin was to 
    die of tuberculosis, from which he had long suffered, at the early age of 39. 
     Among forms that Chopin made his own was the Nocturne, at one time 
    synonymous with the Serenade, but with the Irish pianist John Field and 
    Chopin, his successor, a lyrical piano piece offering, nominally at least, a poetic 
    vision of the night. Field wrote eighteen piano pieces with this title between the 
    years 1814 and 1835 and these introduced a new form of piano music that was 
    developed not only in the Nocturne but in other separate movements for piano 
    throughout the century. 
                                  Chopin's 
     The three nocturnesthat make up Opus9 were written either during 
    final period in Warsaw or during his first months abroad. They were published 
    in  Paris  in  1833,  with  a  dedication  to  Thomas  De  Quincey's  "celestial 
    pianofortist" Marie Moke, once engaged to Berlioz, but from 1831 until their 
    separation four years later, the wife of the piano-manufacturer Camille Pleyel, 
    in whose Salle Pleyel Chopin gave his first public concert in Paris. The B flat 
    minor Nocturne, Opus 9, No. 1, with its more embellished melodic line and 
                           E flat Nocturne and a third 
    passionate central section is followed by the familiar 
    of rather more energetic character in B major. 
     The three Nocturnes of Opus 15 were published by Maurice Schlesinger in 
    1834 with a dedication to Ferdinand Hiller, who had impressed Chopin as a 
    boy with great talent.  Hiller was a pupil of  Hummel and a close friend of 
    Mendelssohn. The first of the set, in 
                    F major, has a passionate F minor central 
    section, followed by an F sharp major Nocturne of  greater complexity and a 
        G minor Nocturne, marked Lento, languid0 e rubato. 
    gentler 
     Schlesinger, a somewhat unprincipled publisher, satirised by Flaubert, who 
    was in love with Schlesinger's wife, published the Opus 
                             27 Nocturnes in 1836, 
    with a dedication to Countess Apponyi, wife of  the Austrian ambassador in 
    Paris, who brought Johann Strauss to Paris in the same year.  Chopin had 
    deplored the tastes of Vienna and the dominance of Strauss and Lanner, both 
    enjoying, to his expressed surprise, the title of Kapellmeister. The C sharp 
              27, No. 1, has at its heart a more dramatic A flat major 
    minor Nocturne, Opus 
              section, while the 1 Nocturne in D flat major, the second of the set, marked 
              Lento sostenuto, includes more elaborate chromatic embellishment. 
                  The eleventh of Chopin's Nocturnes, in the key of B major, opens the set of 
              two published in Berlin in 1837 and forming Opus 32.  The nocturnes were 
              dedicated this time to  Baronne de Billing, a pupil of the composer.  The first 
              of  the  pair  lacks elaborate ornamentation, with  a conclusion of  dramatic 
              contrast.  The second, in A flat major, has a brief chordal introduction before 
              moving into a more familiar texture.  Its central section includes an excursion 
              into the key of  F sharp minor. 
                  The C minor Nocturne of 1837 was only published 100 years later. 
                  The second attempt at the form, the Nocturne in C sharp minor, was written 
                           Chooin's last vear in Warsaw. which he left. never to return, on 2nd 
              in 1830,           he directhn Lento con gran espressione indicates the character 
              November. 
              of the work, which was first published posthumously in Poznan in 1875. 
              ldil Biret 
                  Born in Ankara,  ldil Biret began piano lessons at the age of  three.  She 
              displayed an outstandina  aift for  music  and graduated  from  the  Paris 
              Cons&atoire  with three fkit-prizes when she was fifteen.  She studied piano 
                                                         Kemofl, and composition with Nadia Boulanaer. 
              with Alfred Cortot and Wilhelm 
              Since the age of sixteen ldil Biret hasperformed in concerts around the world 
              playing with  major orchestras under the direction of  conductors such as 
              Monteux,  Boult,  Kempe,  Sargent, de  Burgos,  Pritchard,  Groves  and 
              Mackerras.  She has participated in the festivals of  Montreal, Persepolis, 
              Royan, La Rochelle, Athens, Berlin, Gstaad and Istanbul. She was also invited 
              to perform at the 85th birthday celebration of Wilhelm Backhaus and at the 
              90th birthdav celebration of  Wilhelm Kemoff.  ldil Biret received the  Lilv 
              Boulanger ~bmorial Fund award (1 954/196k), the Harriet CohenIDinu ~i~atii 
              Gold Medal (1 959) and the Polish Artistic Merit Award (1 974) and was named 
              Chevalier de l'ordre du Merite in 1976.                                      ,       3 
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