Fantasy on Polish Airs (Chopin)

Frédéric Chopin wrote six works for piano and orchestra, including two concertos. The Fantasy on Polish Airs in A major, Op. 13, was the second of his concertante works, written in 1828-30. The piece is also sometimes referred to as "Fantasia on Polish Airs," "Grande fantaisie" or "Fantaisie brillante". Chopin himself referred to it as his "Potpourri on Polish themes", and kept it in his repertoire for many years.

The Fantasy followed the highly successful Variations on "Là ci darem la mano", Op. 2 of 1827. It was written while a student of Józef Elsner at the Warsaw Conservatory.

The orchestration calls for flutes, oboes, clarinets (in A), bassoons, horns (in A), trumpets (in D), timpani (A and E), and strings. The work contains three main themes, two of which are traditional folk melodies.

The piece starts with a 55-measure introduction marked Largo non troppo. The introduction is in common time and concludes on a chord of the dominant seventh.

The next section is based on "Już miesiąc zaszedł psy się uśpiły (The moon had set, the dogs were asleep)." This popular Polish folk song was sung to words from Franciszek Karpiński's idyll "Laura i Filon". Significantly, the song was a favorite of Chopin's mother. The section lasts from mm. 56 to 127. The meter is 6/8. The section begins in A major and ends on C# minor.

This section features a melody in the style of a dumka or possibly based on a Ukrainian duple-time round dance or kolomyjka, from an opera by Chopin's compatriot Karol Kurpiński. According to Halina Goldberg, the dumka is a quotation from Kurpinski's Elegy on the Death of Tadeusz_Kościuszko, which commemorated the death of this Polish hero in 1817. The section lasts from mm. 128 to 245. The meter is 2/4. The section begins on F# minor and ends on a G# minor triad.

The piece is rounded out with a lively Kujawiak, "Jedzie Jasio od Torunia (Johnny Goes from Torun)". The kujawiak lasts from mm. 246 to 350. The meter is the typical 3/4.

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