Hogarth on Chopin

“He accomplishes enormous difficulties, but so quietly, so smoothly and with such constant delicacy and refinement that the listener is not sensible of their real magnitude.  It is the exquisite delicacy, with the liquid mellowness of his tone, and the pearly roundness of his passages of rapid articulation which are the peculiar features of his execution, while his music is characterised by freedom of thought, varied expression and a kind of romantic melancholy which seems the natural mood of the artist’s mind.”

George Hogarth, in the Daily News, 10 July 1848.  Cited in: Zaluski, Iweo & Pamela (1993) The Scottish Autumn of Frederick Chopin. Edinburgh: John Donald Publishers, p.7.

Incidentally, Chopin used to refer to the Daily News as “Delinius”.

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