Busoni Fugue from Chopin Variations

[panic]

Does anyone have the Busoni Variations on a theme of Chopin? The fugue sounds like it kicks ass.

[thalbergmad]

Here it is.

Never heard it myself, but it looks interesting.

I do like Busoni, but his longer works tend to not hold my attention.

Thal

[jre58591]

i think he means the variations and fugue on a theme of chopin, which is like 3 times as long and has a fugue at the end. here it is. enjoy.

btw this is one of the few pieces ive heard madge do semi-correctly. john ogdon kicks ass with the one without the fugue.

[panic]

Thanks.
The fugue, indeed, kicks innumerable amounts of ass. I just wish I could play it...

[cygnusdei]

The Variations and Fugue was written in 1884. The revised version, the Variations, was completed in 1922. Actually the fugue was not discarded, but transformed and abbreviated into one of the variations.

The Variations (1922) is one of my favorite pieces (this is the version that I was first acquainted to, so I may be a little bit biased against the 1884 version, which seems long winded). Anyway, this piece has a nice blend of classical style and 20th century sensibilities.

Interestingly it shares the same opus number (Op. 22) with Rachmaninov's own Chopin Variations.