The seventeen Polish songs were composed between 1824 and 1844.  In the psychology of the Lied Chopin was not happy.  Karasowski writes that many of the songs were lost and some of them are still sung in Poland, their origin being hazy.  The Third of May is cited as one of these.  Chopin had a habit of playing songs for his friends, but neglected putting some of them on paper.  The collected songs are under the opus head 74.  The words are by his friends, Stephen Witwicki, Adam Mickiewicz, Bogdan Zaleski and Sigismond Krasinski.  The first in the key of A, the familiar Maiden’s Wish, has been brilliantly paraphrased by Liszt.  This pretty mazurka is charmingly sung and played by Marcella Sembrich in the singing lesson of “The Barber of Seville.”  There are several mazurkas in the list.  Most of these songs are mediocre.  Poland’s Dirge is an exception, and so is Horsemen Before the Battle.  “Was ein junges Madchen liebt” has a short introduction, in which the reminiscence hunter may find a true bit of “Meistersinger” color.  Simple in structure and sentiment, the Chopin lieder seem almost rudimentary compared to essays in this form by Schubert, Schumann, Franz, Brahms and Tschaikowsky.

A word of recommendation may not be amiss here regarding the technical study of Chopin.  Kleczynski, in his two books, gives many valuable hints, and Isidor Philipp has published a set of Exercises Quotidiens, made up of specimens in double notes, octaves and passages taken from the works.  Here skeletonized are the special technical problems.  In these Daily Studies, and his edition of the Etudes, are numerous examples dealt with practically.  For a study of Chopin’s ornaments, Mertke has discussed at length the various editorial procedure in the matter of attacking the trill in single and double notes, also the easiest method of executing the flying scud and vapors of the fioriture.  This may be found in No. 179 of the Edition Steingraber.  Philipp’s collection is published in Paris by J. Hamelle, and is prefixed by some interesting remarks of Georges Mathias.  Chopin’s portrait in 1833, after Vigneron, is included.

One composition more is to be considered.  In 1837 Chopin contributed the sixth variation of the march from “I Puritani.”  These variations were published under the title:  “Hexameron:  Morceau de Concert.  Grandes Variations de bravoure sur la marche des Puritans de Bellini, composees pour le concert de Madame la Princesse Belgiojoso au benefice des pauvres, par mm.  Liszt, Thalberg, Pixis, H. Herz, Czerny et Chopin.”  Liszt wrote an orchestral accompaniment, never published.  His pupil, Moriz Rosenthal, is the only modern virtuoso who plays the Hexameron in his concerts, and play it he does with overwhelming splendor.  Chopin’s contribution in E major is in his sentimental, salon mood.  Musically, it is the most impressive of this extraordinary mastodonic survival of the “pianistic” past.