New Piano Piece by Chopin Discovered

A previously unknown manuscript by Frédéric Chopin has been discovered at New York’s Morgan Library and Museum. The handwritten score is titled “Valse” and consists of 24 bars of music in the key of A minor and is considered a major discovery in the wold of classical piano music.

The manuscript was discovered in 2019 by conservator Dr. Robinson McClellan during a routine inspection of a collection of cultural memorabilia (“Arthur Satz Collection”), also including letters from Brahms and Tchaikovsky as well as postcards signed by Picasso.

“I wondered: What’s going on here? What could this be?” McClellan explained, adding that he did not recognise the music as any of the known waltzes by Chopin. Being unsure of the work’s authenticity, he took a photo of the score and played it on his piano at home. The handwriting matched Chopin’s distinctive style, including characteristic features such as his F-clef notation and specific doodles typical of Chopin.

He sent a photograph to Jeffrey Kallberg, a leading Chopin scholar at the University of Pennsylvania, and after consulting external experts as well as the Morgan’s paper conservators, who has been analyzing the manuscript’s paper and ink, the handwriting and musical style, The Morgan Library concluded that the work is indeed authentic, and hence, this is a significant discovery in the world of classical piano music.

“We have total confidence in our conclusion,” McClellan said. “Now it’s time to put it out there for the world to take a look and form its own opinions.”

“This newly discovered waltz expands our understanding of Chopin as a composer and opens new questions for scholars to consider regarding when he wrote it and for whom it was intended,” he said.

The discovery of an unknown work by Chopin has not happened since the late 1930s.

“This is certainly one of the more interesting discoveries of recent years. Original Chopin manuscripts are extremely rare, and the mere suggestion that we may be dealing with previously unknown music by the Polish composer electrifies pianists and musicologists,” said Dr Artur Szklener, Director of the Fryderyk Chopin Institute.

An unconventional Chopin piece?

While being distinctively shorter than all of Chopin’s other waltzes, it is believed by The Morgan Library that the piece is “complete”, showing the kind of “tightness” expected from a finished work by the composer.

The piece has a rather dramatic eight bar introduction, featuring some extreme dynamic markings (fff), followed by a short and simple 16 bars theme, and no typical ending or coda balancing the introduction.
The manuscript is not signed by Chopin but the page has the title “Chopin” at the top. Why? Is it perhaps a gift card, a guest book entry, a musical joke, or part of a compositional game with other composers?

The manuscript is only slightly larger than an index card (102 x 130 mm, about 4 x 5 inches). Based on other similarly-sized manuscripts by Chopin, it is assumed that it was meant as a gift for inclusion in someone’s autograph album.

What do you think, is this a complete composition by Chopin or a sketch that was intended to be continued?

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Comment by Dr Artur Szklener, Director of the Fryderyk Chopin Institute