Adolf Gutmann: Ballade in f-sharp minor "Conte du soir", Op.50

Before I say something about the biography, I want to thank everyone who decided to donate something recently. It always makes me really happy to see that I also get a bit financially out of the work here on youtube. I am still very busy with my phd thesis in maths (and I sort of really wonder how I still upload a new piece almost every day) but I just love playing these forgotten and obscure pieces and present them to you :) This was first published in 1839, so composed before he was 20 years old.

Gutmann (1819-1882) was born in 1819 in Heidelberg. In 1834 he moved to Paris to take lessons with Chopin.

He soon became Chopin’s favourite pupil, a touring pianist and the dedicatee of the Scherzo in C sharp minor, Op. 39. In the Parisian Salle Pape, in March 1838, he performed together with Chopin, Zimmerman and Alkan, playing the Allegretto and the Finale of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7, arranged by Alkan for eight hands and two pianos.

Next to Fontana, Gutmann was the main copyist of Chopin’s works. He belonged to the closest circle of Chopin’s entourage and was a devoted companion to his master in the last years of the latter’s life. In 1866 he travelled to Egypt, Syria and Palestine and after the Franco-Prussian War moved to Florence. In 1880, he settled in La Spezia, where he died in 1882.

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