Introduction & Polonaise brillante in C Major

Every work that Chopin composed involves the piano. Most are solo pieces, but as well as works for piano and orchestra he also wrote a smattering of chamber music and songs. The Introduction and Polonaise brillante, Op. 3 for cello and piano is a dazzling early work, seemingly inspired by an aristocratic friend from Chopin’s childhood, Prince Antoni Radziwiłł, himself a cellist and composer. Chopin composed the Polonaise in 1829, when he was still a teenager, adding the Introduction the following year. It is likely that the piano part was intended for the prince’s daughter Wanda, to whom Chopin was giving lessons, and in the original version this is far more demanding than the cello part. A “Lento” Introduction paves the way for the sprightly C major Polonaise, in which Chopin underlays the cello’s cantabile melodies with passages of glittering pianistic brilliance. In the 20th century, cellists including the American Leonard Rose edited the work to give the cellist more to do, matching or appropriating virtuoso figuration that Chopin had allocated to the piano.