28 Mowery ⦁ Chopin Polish Sympathies north could know that in Chopin’s works, in the simple strains of his mazurkas, there lurks a dangerous enemy, he would place a ban on music. Chopin’s works are cannons buried under flowers!”50 Chopin’s student Wilhelm von Lenz described him as “the only political pianist” and that “he set Poland to music!”51 According to Jonathan Bellman, he was viewed as having “a nationalistic story to tell, but it was a safely distant and exotic one.”52 Evidently, Europeans did not mind supporting his music as nationalistic since it did not directly affect them. On the other hand, his fellow Poles appreciated that his works supported Polish nationalism “but demanded more, far more, than he was able to produce, and he was not really an equal.”53 Chopin was not truly a part of either group because he wanted to support his country, but in his own way. However, some people debate whether Chopin was truly a nationalistic composer at all. According to Michael Murphy, Chopin did not believe he was part of a “national school of composers” for Poland,54 and he considered himself more of an independent musician. This begs the question of whether he truly fits the description of a nationalist composer. Harry White argues that he was in fact viewed as nationalistic by other Poles at the time, but his art was seen as separate from his nationalistic efforts, and “in Warsaw, no less than in Paris, the narrative power of Chopin’s art music supervened its nationalistic origins.”55 His musical genius was appreciated beyond his ties to the Poles. Stanisław Moniuszko was another Polish composer, a contemporary of Chopin, and he created a distinction between national music and universal music, placing himself in the national world and Chopin in the universal world.56 Again, it seems as if Chopin was not quite Polish enough for some. Even so, his use of the idiom of folk music in conjunction with “techniques of contemporary art music” created a precedent for “Slavonic nationalists” later in the latter part of the 1800s.57 Another related idea is to place Chopin’s music in the category of exoticism. The French in Paris tended to see Poland as exotic and oriental 50 Gengaro, Experiencing Chopin, 72. 51 Bellman, Chopin's Polish Ballade,142. 52 Bellman, Chopin’s Polish Ballade, 143. 53 Bellman, Chopin’s Polish Ballade, 143. 54 White and Murphy, eds., Musical Constructions of Nationalism, 174. 55 White and Murphy, eds., Musical Constructions of Nationalism, 260. 56 White and Murphy, eds., Musical Constructions of Nationalism, 175. 57 Samson, Chopin, 96.
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