Editing Frédéric Chopin (section)

====Paris====
[[File:Chopin, by Wodzinska.JPG|thumb|upright=0.9|Chopin at 25, by his fiancée [[Maria Wodzińska]], 1835]]
When he left Warsaw on 2 November 1830, Chopin had intended to go to Italy, but violent unrest there made that a dangerous destination. His next choice was Paris; difficulties obtaining a visa from Russian authorities resulted in him obtaining transit permission from the French. In later years he would quote the passport's endorsement {{lang|fr|"Passeport en passant par Paris à Londres"}} ("In transit to London via Paris"), joking that he was in the city "only in passing".{{sfn|Walker|2018|p=202}} Chopin arrived in Paris on 5 October 1831;
<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Helman|first1=Zofia|last2=Wróblewska-Straus|first2=Hanna|date=2007|title=The Date of Chopin's Arrival in Paris|journal=Musicology Today|publisher=Sciendo|volume=4|pages=95–103|issn=1734-1663}}</ref> he would never return to Poland,{{sfn|Samson|2001|loc=§1 ¶6}} thus becoming one of many expatriates of the Polish [[Great Emigration]]. In France, he used the French versions of his given names, and after receiving French citizenship in 1835, he travelled on a French passport.{{refn|A French passport used by Chopin is shown at the website "Chopin – musicien français"<ref>{{cite web |url=http://diaph16.free.fr/chopin//chopin7.htm |title=Passeport français de Chopin |last=Langavant |first=Emmanuel |date= |website=Chopin&nbsp;– musicien français website |access-date=28 March 2021 |archive-date=13 July 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170713074357/http://diaph16.free.fr/chopin/chopin7.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>|group=n}} Chopin remained close to his fellow Poles in exile as friends and confidants. He never felt fully comfortable speaking French or considered himself to be French, despite his father's French origins. He always saw himself as a Pole, [[Adam Zamoyski]] wrote.{{sfn|Zamoyski|2010|p=128}}

In Paris, Chopin encountered artists and other distinguished figures and found many opportunities to exercise his talents and achieve celebrity. During his years in Paris, he was to become acquainted with, among many others, [[Hector Berlioz]], [[Franz Liszt]], [[Ferdinand Hiller]], [[Heinrich Heine]], [[Eugène Delacroix]], [[Alfred de Vigny]],{{sfn|Zamoyski|2010|p=106}} and [[Friedrich Kalkbrenner]], who introduced him to the piano manufacturer [[Camille Pleyel]].{{sfn|Walker|2018|p=219}} This was the beginning of a long and close association between the composer and Pleyel's instruments.{{sfn|Eigeldinger|2001|loc=passim}} Chopin was also acquainted with the poet [[Adam Mickiewicz]], principal of the Polish Literary Society, some of whose verses he set as songs.{{sfn|Zamoyski|2010|p=128}} He also was more than once guest of Marquis [[Marquis de Custine|Astolphe de Custine]], one of his fervent admirers, playing his works in Custine's salon.{{sfn|Walker|2018|pp=302 ff., 309, 365}}

Two Polish friends in Paris were also to play important roles in Chopin's life there. A fellow student at the Warsaw Conservatory, Julian Fontana, had originally tried unsuccessfully to establish himself in England; Fontana was to become, in the words of the music historian Jim Samson, Chopin's "general [[servant|factotum]] and copyist".{{sfn|Samson|2001|loc=§3 ¶2}} [[Wojciech Grzymała|Albert Grzymała]], who in Paris became a wealthy financier and society figure, often acted as Chopin's adviser and, in Zamoyski's words, "gradually began to fill the role of elder brother in [his] life".{{sfn|Zamoyski|2010|pp=106–107}}

On 7 December 1831, Chopin received the first major endorsement from an outstanding contemporary when [[Robert Schumann]], reviewing the Op. 2 Variations in the {{lang|de|Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung}} (his first published article on music), declared: "Hats off, gentlemen! A genius."{{sfn|Schumann|1988|pp=15–17}} On 25 February 1832 Chopin gave a debut Paris concert in the {{lang|fr|"salons de MM Pleyel"}} at 9 rue Cadet, which drew universal admiration. The critic [[François-Joseph Fétis]] wrote in the {{lang|fr|[[Revue et gazette musicale]]}}: "Here is a young man who&nbsp;... taking no model, has found, if not a complete renewal of piano music,&nbsp;... an abundance of original ideas of a kind to be found nowhere else&nbsp;..."{{sfn|Zamoyski|2010|p=88}} After this concert, Chopin realised that his essentially intimate keyboard technique was not optimal for large concert spaces. Later that year he was introduced to the wealthy [[Rothschild family|Rothschild]] banking family, whose [[patronage]] also opened doors for him to other private [[salon (gathering)|salons]] (social gatherings of the aristocracy and artistic and literary elite).{{sfn|Hedley|2005|pp=263–264}} By the end of 1832 Chopin had established himself among the Parisian musical elite and had earned the respect of his peers such as Hiller, Liszt, and Berlioz. He no longer depended financially upon his father, and in the winter of 1832, he began earning a handsome income from publishing his works and teaching piano to affluent students from all over Europe.{{sfn|Samson|2001|loc=§2, paras. 4–5}} This freed him from the strains of public concert-giving, which he disliked.{{sfn|Hedley|2005|pp=263–264}}

Chopin seldom performed publicly in Paris. In later years he generally gave a single annual concert at the Salle Pleyel, a venue that seated three hundred. He played more frequently at salons but preferred playing at his own Paris apartment for small groups of friends. The musicologist [[Arthur Hedley]] has observed that "As a pianist Chopin was unique in acquiring a reputation of the highest order on the basis of a minimum of public appearances{{snd}}few more than thirty in the course of his lifetime."{{sfn|Hedley|2005|pp=263–264}} The list of musicians who took part in some of his concerts indicates the richness of Parisian artistic life during this period. Examples include a concert on 23 March 1833, in which Chopin, Liszt, and Hiller performed (on pianos) a [[Harpsichord concertos (J. S. Bach)#Concertos for three harpsichords|concerto by J. S. Bach for three keyboards]]; and, on 3 March 1838, a concert in which Chopin, his pupil [[Adolphe Gutmann]], [[Charles-Valentin Alkan]], and Alkan's teacher [[Pierre-Joseph-Guillaume Zimmermann|Joseph Zimmermann]] performed Alkan's arrangement, for eight hands, of two movements from [[Ludwig van Beethoven|Beethoven]]'s [[Symphony No. 7 (Beethoven)|7th symphony]].{{sfn|Conway|2012|p=226 & note 9}} Chopin was also involved in the composition of Liszt's ''[[Hexameron (musical composition)|Hexameron]]''; he wrote the sixth (and final) variation on [[Vincenzo Bellini|Bellini]]'s theme. Chopin's music soon found success with publishers, and in 1833 he contracted with [[Maurice Schlesinger]], who arranged for it to be published not only in France but, through his family connections, also in Germany and England.{{sfn|Samson|2001|loc=§2 ¶5}}{{refn|For Schlesinger's international network see Conway(2012), pp. 185–187, 238–239{{sfn|Conway|2012}}|group=n}}

[[File:Maria Wodzińska.jpeg|thumb|left|upright=0.9|[[Maria Wodzińska]], self-portrait]]
In the spring of 1834, Chopin attended the Lower Rhenish Music Festival in [[Aachen|Aix-la-Chapelle]] with Hiller, and it was there that Chopin met Felix Mendelssohn. After the festival, the three visited [[Düsseldorf]], where Mendelssohn had been appointed musical director. They spent what Mendelssohn described as "a very agreeable day", playing and discussing music at his piano, and met [[Friedrich Wilhelm Schadow]], director of the Academy of Art, and some of his eminent pupils such as [[Karl Friedrich Lessing|Lessing]], [[Eduard Bendemann|Bendemann]], [[Eduard Hildebrandt|Hildebrandt]] and [[Karl Ferdinand Sohn|Sohn]].{{sfn|Niecks|1902|loc= vol. 1, p. 274}} In 1835 Chopin went to [[Karlovy Vary|Carlsbad]], where he spent time with his parents; it was the last time he would see them. On his way back to Paris, he met old friends from Warsaw, the Wodzińskis, their sons, and their daughters, amongst which [[Maria Wodzińska|Maria]], whom he occasionally had given piano lessons in Poland.{{sfn|Walker|2018|p=279}} This meeting prompted him to stay for two weeks in Dresden, when he had previously intended to return to Paris via [[Leipzig]].{{sfn|Zamoyski|2010|pp=118–119}} The sixteen-year-old girl's portrait of the composer has been considered, along with Delacroix's, as among the best likenesses of Chopin.{{sfn|Szulc|1998|p=137}}
In October he finally reached Leipzig, where he met Schumann, [[Clara Schumann|Clara Wieck]], and Mendelssohn, who organised for him a performance of his own oratorio ''[[St. Paul (oratorio)|St. Paul]]'', and who considered him "a perfect musician".{{sfn|Zamoyski|2010|pp=119–120}} In July 1836 Chopin travelled to [[Marienbad]] and [[Dresden]] to be with the Wodziński family, and in September he proposed to Maria, whose mother Countess Wodzińska approved in principle. Chopin went on to Leipzig, where he presented Schumann with his [[Ballade No. 1 (Chopin)|G minor Ballade]].{{sfn|Zamoyski|2010|pp=126–127}} At the end of 1836, he sent Maria an album in which his sister Ludwika had inscribed seven of his songs, and his 1830 [[Nocturne in C-sharp minor, Op. posth. (Chopin)|Nocturne in C-sharp minor, ''Lento con gran espresisione'']].{{sfn|Jachimecki|1937|p=423}}{{sfn|Walker|2018|p=299}} The anodyne thanks he received from Maria proved to be the last letter he was to have from her.{{sfn|Chopin|1962|p=144}} Chopin placed the letters he had received from Maria and her mother into a large envelope, wrote on it the words "My sorrow" ({{lang|pl|"Moja bieda"}}), and to the end of his life retained in a desk drawer this keepsake of the second love of his life.{{sfn|Jachimecki|1937|p=423}}{{refn|A photo of the letters packet survives, though the originals seem to have been lost during World War II.{{sfn|Walker|2018|p = 307}}|group=n}}