Also, it's worth noting that in his other recording of the work that Rubinstein did indeed pipe down a little with the tempo. Perhaps you are correct, for all I know. But you will forgive me if I am somewhat skeptical of how exactly you get to your conclusion. That said, I do appreciate your opinion.

If you know how to dance a mazurka, then you know that there is a range of tempos in which a mazurka can be danced in a graceful and enjoyable manner. Outside that range there is no dancing. There is a simple test: get up and dance and discover an appropriate dance tempo for youself. If you do, I think you'll find that your dance tempo is slower than that of pianists who play Chopin's dance music as abstractions without any concrete grounding in the dance itself. Trust your feet.

No cóż, profeska!

When I'm right, I'm happy to stand alone. I'm right. Look up the word "vivace" and you'll find that it means "lively." It comes from Latin "vivax" meaning lively, full of life. From the Latin we get the English word "vivacious" meaning full of life. Notice: there's no association with "fast." Even great pianists can play pieces too fast. Listen to Horowitz's version. You'll like it better if you give it a chance. His version is truly "vivace" and not merely fast.

It's worth reading Thieme: "Nouvelle Theorie sur les differens mouvemens de la musique moderne"-1801 He doesn't understand that in the old days they had a much faster sense of tempo than we do in modern times. Evidence for this is the fact that on the early metronomes they considered prestissimo to be around 300bpm, whereas on the modern metronome prestissimo is measured between 200-208 bpm. By extension this also means that vivace is going to be much faster than Horowitz considered it to be.

Masterful.

btw there are of course no mazurkas with such fast tempos,but li`s tempo is absolut ok. but you can play how fast YOU want.

Also, just to clarify my last comment, I am not an advocate of using the metronome. I'm actually quite firmly against it, but; I will admit it is a valuable piece of evidence that can debase those who are very poorly informed, such as jimtrueblue99. The book I mentioned is extremely important to understand the thinking of composers such as Chopin, as they knew baroque ideas much better than they do 20th century ones.

i like it slower too,but that has nothing to do with dancing .chopin didnt wrote his waltz and mazurkas for dancing.chopin himself wrote a lot of tempi in his works and some of them are so fast that the best dancer in the world couldnt dance to. and if you think chopin wrote "dance music",then you dont know much about him.

Up until 1945, pianists still played "normally". That was when this silly modern 'trend' began, when they started to loose touch with the thinking of the 19th century. Even with Horowitz, in his early recordings he played MUCH faster than he did later on in his life. I don't have anything against playing it at a slower tempo, but to insist that it's "correct" and then chastising Rubinstein on such a baseless assertion is going too far.

Trusting my [own] feet has nothing to do with objectively studying the composer's intentions. That said you have no right to imply that Rubinstein treats this as an abstraction. In fact Rubinstein was known to enjoy dancing (among many other things life had to offer). I don't find your reasoning to be objective, however if you were to cite a historical source that supports >your< perception of the 'dance tempo', and that can be linked directly to Chopin himself. I will strand corrected.

I'll tell you what: play Chopin just as fast as you want--zip right through all his works. In fact, play everybody's music just as fast as you want. Play everything at one tempo. And play everything with one dynamic--loud. There. All your problems are solved. You don't have to exercise judgment or taste or intelligence or scholarship or anything else that gets in the way of you doing as you please. Suit yourself--that's only standard in music you need. Go for it, pal. Enjoy.

i never said something like you just said. chopin`s works are no menuets from the 17th or 18th century. you say,chopin`s dances should be played like....blabla....and you ignore chopin`s own indications.its so obvious,that you have to play f.e. op.64/1 the e-minor valse or the op.70/1 very fast.not as fast as possible,but faster than you can dance.this are brilliant virtuoso pieces,definately.chopin`s tempo for op.70/1 is "molto vivace dottet half note on 88".thats the facts,out.

That's not what a tautology is. That's you getting your hopes up because you found two terms that share one word in common. Even if your contention were true, it would be irrelevant, as you've already pointed out that this is concert music, not music to be danced to. You can play it at the tempo you'd like. You don't need to blame Rubinstein just because you stumbled while trying to dance to this.

Is not Rubinatein!!!

No kidding. You'd think someone could put a little more thought into his criticism of the of a professional Polish pianist's (who was born in the 19th century even) interpretations of Chopin.

@FreieStadtElbing, Well unfortunately I could not spare Germany from the same fate. Where this video is banned from viewing.

Elbląg raczej nie za bardzo może aspirować do miana państwa-miasta

Au contraire, my dear maestro. Vivace for a dance is not the same as vivace for an etude. Lively doesn't mean the same thing as fast. Dance tempo for dance music--even in a tavern. It's not the 100 yard dash. Have you ever danced? At an appropriate tempo, the beauty of the dance comes through. Just listen to Horowitz.

I wouldn't cite Mr. Horowitz as a credible source to understanding Chopin's intention if I were you. While I respect him (the younger him anyway), he is known for giving music his own shape above all else rather than trying to recreate the composers intention (No, I'm not criticizing him). More-so, it is possible for me to turn your contention "Dance tempo for dance music" against you, because now you're treading into subjective territory. But I must admit that I am too.

This is not Rubinstein

Dance tempo is the appropriate tempo for dance music. This statement isn't just true; it's a tautology. Not everything is relative. Want a fast dance? Do the jitterbug. The mazurka isn't the jitterbug. BTW, are you always this abusive when you disagree with somebody over minor matters? What do you do when you argue about something really important? Pull out a gun?

You clearly do not understand what "Vivace" means. And Chopin himself is known to have remarked that the first repeat of the A section portrays a scene much like that of a Tavern. Any slower and this idea is certainly lost.

Guy, I know that these are concert dances, not ballroom dances. C'mon. Give me a break. That said, they are still dances and should be played in dance tempo. Think of playing a minuet. Do you really want to zip through a minuet prestissimo just because nobody's dancing? Really?

Perhaps the ancient version of 1938 - 1939. I prefer the recording from 1960's years for RCA Records

Too fast.

The fact that you are thinking about tempo in terms of right and wrong is fucked to begin with. If you want to claim vivace doesn't carry a tempo implication, then you have no ground to stand on - if it doesn't mean "fast" it sure as hell doesn't mean "slow enough to please some butthurt kid centuries later." You might not want to listen to it at this tempo, but that doesn't mean Rubinstein played it too fast, it means there's a problem on your end.

Pointing me to Horowitz is hardly an eye-opener. Unlike you, I don't like one tempo for this to the exclusion of other tempos. Even if I did, I wouldn't try to blame the performer for messing it up. There is more to this recording than its tempo, and it's foolish to disregard the entire thing for one reason. The piece has a long way to go before it's incomprehensible - maybe 1:40 to 1:30. This tempo brings out different aspects. Try thinking of it as a 2 meter where every measure is a beat.

I did not like Rubinstein 's playing this Mazurka. He had recorded that in other occasion, better then this. The LP The Chopin I love II has it.

Not the best of his rendition. overfull tempo without any countering. This contrary to his previous renditions. Once Arthur had a live broadcast,in which he played this Mazurka with double bass and greater fortissimo.(early 60s) Although,a difficult Item,to fill in musically. But very inportant,this item should not be played with too much pianissimo.Rather wit grand fortissimo! Such as once Michael Block and also (beit somewhat less) Alexander Uninsky.

Nobody is advocating playing everything at the same tempo or dynamic besides you - you whine that since this piece is in a 3 meter it's automatically too fast while disregarding all the other facets of this interpretation (and how they work with the uplifting tempo). In short, you're way too hung up on the word "dance."