Mimic Chopin?

[sinding]

Although not to do with Chopin's life or works, I thought it might be the best place to post.
If you live in the UK you most likely have heard of Joseph Cooper. He had his own programme on TV calle 'Face the music'. It was a quiz with Joseph as questionaire and pianist. One of the items was a piece of music composed of a well known tune in the style of a classical composer. He remarked once that someone showed him how to use certain techniques which could be used to mimic the style of any composer. I was particularly taken by one of his renditions of a common tune in the style of Chopin. He never actually explained the method and now that he is late, the secret has gone with him. Does anyone have any idea of how it was done?

[tony]

there is this ceartain trill that was very important in chopins music!

[Fryderyk]

I have also seen som improvisers who can improvies any given tune in the manner of composers such as Chopin, Mozart, Bach, Liszt, Brahms etc, you name it.

The trick? Well the different styles of the composers are like accents. The time period affected them of course, but every composer has his/her own accent, or what you in music can call harmonic accent, rythmic accent and so on. Study the harmonic style of Chopin, his ornaments. Try to use the chords from a piece by Chopin and make up your own melody in the same chords, and you will hear that only the left hand self sounds very much like Chopin.

Listen to the part called "Chopin" in Schumanns carnaval, opus nine, you´ll find an old age mimic of Copin.

[tony]

Ijust heard this piece by schumann and Iam know officialy turned on to his mysic!! it ws the fantasy aschwung!!! amazing!!!! i think its compatible to chopin!!

[tony]

wicht schuman piece that was titlaled in the carnival (chopin)
wat number is it?

[Jeliness2]

"Chopin" is 9/12

[sinding]

I think I will have a go at your suggestion Fryderyk. I'll pick some of his chords and try an improvisation on those chords in the left hand and try a somewhat compatible tune in the right. I do realise of course that my tune might not be possible to fit with all the left hand but i'll give it a go.

[CelticBiker]

I watched this series passionately when I was a kid, growing up on a council estate in a family of complete philistines. Top of the Pops was the main fare in our house.
Unfortunately, I'm not sure I ever managed to see them all, as I don't recall them being repeated, and I have since searched in vain for any repeat showings onTV or DVD/video recordings, so any leads in that direction would be very welcome.
I would say that the hidden melodies were deliciously crafted and consummately performed, much better in fact than Jo did his Chopin. I have a painfully slow and clumsy recording of him playing the oh-so-popular Polonaise in A flat!
However, I do have a cassette tape somewhere of a selection of hidden melodies, which I will try to search out, as another friend of mine is also interested in them, and she is too young to have ever seen the series.
As for the handiwork involved, I think it was a talent on the part of Jo Cooper for spotting the similarity between the components of a tune and its resemblance to classical tunes penned by famous authors. No time to go into detail here, but I think it's obvious that some of the sea shanties like Drunken Sailor are fairly easy to knock into shape à la Vaughan Williams or Benjamin Britten, whereas one of the others that he set in the style of Mozart came out in such a Mozartian guise that it was hard to remember it was actually only a popular tune, written much later.
When composing in the style of Chopin, and I did this for my music A-level many times, I think the obvious things are to emphasize thirds and sixths, alternatingly and then add in a nocturne-type bass (think D flat here) for starters. Then certain rhythms are typically his (though not exclusively, of course): polonaise, bolero, mazurka.
I could go on, but I'm sure there are others out there better qualified to do this.
Tim (amateur pianist, Chopin fan, motorcycle freak and general nerd)