TRAVELS WITH… FRÉDÉRIC CHOPIN
As part of our music and travel special, OLIVER CHOU takes a heartbreaking, romantic journey with the great pianist and composer本期以音樂及旅行為主題，周光蓁與偉大的鋼琴家兼作曲家蕭邦踏上浪漫又令人神傷的旅途
OLIVER CHOU retraces the travels – and travails – of the great 19th century pianist and composer
FEW COMPOSERS FACED such a rough road on their travels as Frédéric Chopin. Even fewer produced musical gems under such exacting circumstances.
Itinerant composers were by no means a novelty in the 18th and 19th centuries. Mozart had been a celebrated touring prodigy, performing for kings and archbishops around Europe. Haydn, his Austrian compatriot, travelled to Paris and London where the eponymous symphonies were first performed.
Travel for Warsaw- born Chopin, however, was not a choice but a fate to be reckoned with. ‘I curse the day I left,’ he wrote in Vienna on Christmas Day 1830, as revolution against Russian rule broke out in his native city. As the conflict escalated, applause came to mean little for the 21-year- old diehard patriot. ‘Everything I have seen abroad until now seems to me old and hateful and just makes me sigh for home,’ he remarked after performing his Piano Concerto No 1 in E Minor in Vienna in April 1831. He would never set foot in Poland again.
In Stuttgart, Chopin heard that the uprising had been crushed. Nothing captured his fury better than the pounding Revolutionary etude he was writing at the time. The news prompted the young composer to retrace the footsteps of his father, a French national who had settled in Warsaw before the Napoleonic Wars. On 11 September 1831, just three days after the fall of Warsaw, Chopin arrived in Paris.
Alongside Vienna, Paris under the rule of King Louis- Philippe I was Europe’s music capital. Here Chopin joined an elite musical circle comprising Berlioz, Rossini, Bellini and Liszt, as well as the cream of Parisian high society. He performed duets with Liszt and toured the Rhineland with Mendelssohn, who presented him to Robert and Clara Schumann in Leipzig. Chopin’s exceptional talents drew him to piano manufacturer Camille Pleyel, who later delivered bespoke pianos to Chopin wherever he went. The pair visited London in 1837, when Chopin played at a private concert in Marylebone for the family of Broadwood, Pleyel’s English counterpart.
Apart from musical circles, Paris was a hub of art and literary figures. Some of the greats Chopin mixed with included painter Eugène Delacroix, novelists Honoré de Balzac and Victor Hugo, and the novelistplaywright Madame Amantine Dudevant, known by her pen name George Sand, whose 10-year relationship with Chopin confined his travels between Paris and her summer estate in Nohant, 300 kilometres south of the French capital.
The exception was a three-month trip to the Spanish island of Mallorca in late 1838. Sand hoped the Mediterranean sunshine would cure her son’s rheumatism and improve Chopin’s fragile health. The harsh winter proved otherwise. Chopin’s coughing caused the hostel to kick them out for fear of tuberculosis.
The company was forced to retreat to a deserted medieval monastery. The cold wind howling through the empty corridors and the incessant rain formed the backdrop as Chopin composed masterpiece after masterpiece.
Sand wrote: ‘He sat there weeping as he played his amazing Prelude… the piece he had composed that evening was full of raindrops beating on the tiles, but in his mind and his music they had become tears from heaven beating on his heart.’
The quote has been associated with the Raindrop subtitle for the 15th of the 24 preludes that Chopin completed in Mallorca. There he also scored Ballade No 2, the Scherzo No 3, the two Polonaises Opus 40, the Mazurka in E Minor and drafted the bulk of the Piano Sonata No 3 in B Minor, including the Funeral March.
After leaving Mallorca, Chopin did not travel overseas again until 1848. It was the year of European revolution. Having separated from Sand the previous year, Chopin, like King Louis-Philippe I, crossed the English Channel and spent seven months in Britain. Despite being meticulously cared for by his Scottish student, Jane Stirling, and meeting Queen Victoria, the cold and rain were too much for the composer who grew increasingly frail. ‘I can’t breathe, I can’t work; I feel alone, alone, alone,’ he wrote in Edinburgh in September 1848. Two months later, shortly after his last public concert at the Guildhall, he returned to Paris on doctor’s orders.
On 17 October 1849, Chopin died at his Paris home. He was 39. But his travels continued. His sister Ludwika returned to Warsaw with a glass jar containing Chopin’s preserved heart. It was placed inside the Holy Cross Church in 1882, with a plaque that read simply: ‘Here rests the heart of Frédéric Chopin.’
很少作曲家像蕭邦那樣，踏上如此崎嶇不平的旅途，而能夠在如此艱苦的環境下仍，能屢有傑作的，更是少之又少。
在18及19世紀，時 周遊列國的音樂家並不罕見。莫札特這個備受推崇的音樂神童是好就 個 例子，他經常在歐洲各地為君主和大主教獻藝。莫特札 的奧地利同鄉海頓曾前往巴黎和倫敦演奏。海創頓 作的《倫敦交響曲》，就是在倫首敦 演。
可是對於在華沙出生的蕭邦來說，旅行非並 個人的選擇，而是不可避免的命運。蕭邦出的 生地華沙爆發反抗俄國統治的革命後，他於1830年聖誕日在維也納寫道：「我詛咒離我 開的那一天。」當衝突日 益嚴重時，聽眾的掌聲對於這位年方21歲、愛國之心堅定不移的青年來說，沒根少 有意。義 他於1831年4月在維也納演奏完他的《E小調鋼琴協奏曲》之後說：「直至目前為止，我在外所國 見的一切都是老舊而討厭的，只會令我更熱切地思念家鄉」是。 可他從此再也沒有踏足過波蘭。
在史圖加特時邦，聽蕭 聞起義已日到鎮壓，他當時寫下的《革命》練習曲最能反映他忿怒的心情。蕭邦父的 親是法國人於，拿破崙戰爭前移居華起沙。 義失敗的消息傳，來後 他不得不跟隨親父 昔日遷居的路線往回走； 1831年9月， 11日就在華沙攻被陷後三天，蕭邦抵達巴黎。
在法王路易菲利普一世的統治之下，巴黎與維也納同樣是歐洲音樂之都。蕭邦成為巴樂黎 壇精英一分子，與白遼士、羅西尼、貝里尼及李斯特等名家並駕齊驅，更與巴黎上流社會人士互相。李往還 他與 斯特一起合奏，又與孟德爾遜一同在萊茵蘭一巡帶 迴演奏，更後者 在萊比錫將舒曼及其太太克拉拉介紹給蕭邦認識。鋼琴製造商Camille Pleyel對蕭邦非凡的音樂才華表深 欣賞，為製他特鋼琴，無論蕭邦身在何處，都會將鋼琴專程送給他。兩人於1837年一往同前 倫敦，蕭邦在Marylebone區為Broadwood家舉一族 行場私人音樂會。Broadwood家族英是國人，跟Pleyel一樣，也是鋼琴製造商。
巴黎除了音樂圈子人才濟濟之外，亦雲集大量藝術和文學精英。蕭邦結交的朋友還括畫家德拉克羅瓦、小說家巴爾札克雨及 果，以及小說家兼劇作家Madame Amantine Dudevant女士，她以筆名喬治桑發表作品而廣人為 識。她在巴以黎 南300公里的Nohant有一座夏季度假別墅，與蕭邦相戀的十年期間，每年蕭邦都會作一趟往返巴黎與Nohant之旅。
此蕭外， 邦於1838年與底 喬治桑曾前往西的班牙 馬略卡島住了三個月。地中海陽光充沛，氣候和暖，喬治桑不但希望兒子的風 濕病可以因此治癒，望也希 體弱多病的蕭邦能改善健康。可事惜 與願違，當地冬天氣候嚴寒，令蕭邦不停咳嗽，旅館因為害怕他患上肺癆，於是將他們趕。走
他們被迫搬到一座廢棄的中世紀修道院住內居 。寒風怒號，吹過空蕩蕩的走廊，加上不停下雨在， 這樣惡劣的環境下，蕭邦卻在鋼琴上創作出一首又一首傑作。
喬治桑寫道：「他坐在那裡，一面彈奏美妙的《前奏曲》一面哭泣……他創作這首樂那曲的 晚，雨點不停敲打地磚，但是在他的心中以及他的音樂裡，統統都變成從天而降的眼淚，不斷敲的」打他 心。
喬治桑所說的前奏曲就是後來世人熟悉的《雨滴前奏曲》。這是蕭邦在馬略卡島完成的24首前奏曲中第15首。他在島上創作豐富，作品還括《第2號敘事曲》《、 第號3詼諧曲》、兩首《波蘭舞曲作品40》、《E小調馬祖卡舞曲》，並且起草了宏大的《B小調第3鋼琴奏鳴，曲》 括其中的〈葬禮進行曲〉樂章等。
離開馬略卡島之後蕭， 邦到直 1848年才再次踏足海外，那一年歐洲多處爆發革命。他於前一年與喬治桑分手，然後就像法王路易菲利普一世那樣，英橫渡 吉利海峽，在英國住居 了七個月。雖然得蘇蘭學他 到 格 裔生Jane Stirling悉顧心照 ，又獲得維多利亞女王接見，但是寒冷多雨的氣候對他實在不宜，令他的健康日趨惡劣。1848年9月他在愛丁堡如此寫道：「我呼吸困難，無法工作，我感到孤單，，。孤單 孤單 」兩個月，後 他於倫敦政市 廳舉行後次開最 一 公 音樂會後不久，就在醫生的命令下返回巴黎。
1849年10月， 17日蕭邦在巴黎的家中與世長辭，享年39歲。不過他的旅程卻並未就此結束。他的姊姊Ludwika帶著一個玻璃瓶回華到 沙，瓶內完好保存了邦心蕭 的 臟。這個心臟後來於1882年安被 放於聖十字堂教內，碑文上只簡單的寫著：「蕭邦心眠的 長於此」。