Ballades (Chopin)

[1][2][3] Chopin used the term ballade in the sense of a balletic interlude or dance piece, equivalent to the old Italian ballata.

However, the term may also have connotations of the medieval heroic ballad, a narrative minstrel song, often of a fantastical character.

There are dramatic and dance-like elements in Chopin's use of the genre, and he is a pioneer of the ballade as an abstract musical form.

According to composer and music critic Louis Ehlert, "Each [ballade] differs entirely from the others, and they have but one thing in common – their romantic working out and the nobility of their motifs.

[7] The four ballades have been recorded by many pianists, including Arthur Rubinstein, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Dinu Lipatti, Sviatoslav Richter, Martha Argerich, Emanuel Ax, Andrei Gavrilov, Yundi Li, Seong-Jin Cho, Murray Perahia and Krystian Zimerman.