Slow Chopin - 15 Piano Therapies to Listen to on the Piano / Yuko Toyoda

Why do Chopin's sweet and sorrowful melodies attract us so much?
Chopin, the poet of the piano, was a composer who used the piano as an instrument to create the most original art of the highest quality, with its beauty and technique.

With its delicate movements of sound, the music illuminates the deep parts of our hearts that we are usually unaware of, comforts us, and softly speaks to us by transforming the love within our hearts into sound.
We dream beautiful dreams in Chopin's music and find ourselves in them.
Chopin also never forgot his family and friends in his native Poland, which is perhaps why his music feels like a home to us who listen to it.
Chopin's music reminds us to love.

This album features Chopin's waltzes and nocturnes, some of which he wrote while thinking of his beloved.
The program includes 12 poems from Chopin's heart, including a turn, a romance inspired by the spring forests that Chopin particularly loved, a prelude that he wrote while listening to the birdsong of Mallorca, and a lullaby that was born from his interactions with a friend's children.
While paying homage to the essence of Chopin's music, this is a new attempt to connect with the hearts of those of us living in the modern age, and we have striven to express Chopin's spirit by using a slower tempo and placing importance on each note.

I also included an original piece of music that conveys the message of the sounds heard from Chopin's Forest.
I hope that this album, along with the sounds of nature that make you feel as if you are strolling through Chopin's forest, will reach you...and that you will be able to hear Chopin's poetry from his heart.

To everyone listening to this album

As I wrote in my theme of "On Slow Chopin,"
Why does Chopin's sweet and sad melody
That's what attracts us so much...
I feel that the answer can be found in Chopin's diary, which he left behind.

This passage from Chopin's diary felt to me like Chopin's music itself, so I would like to share with you a short excerpt from Chopin's diary that particularly struck me.

"Why do we struggle through this miserable life only to turn ourselves into corpses?

The clocks on the towers around Stuttgart strike midnight.

Oh, how many people are dead at this moment!

The virtuous and the wicked are the same when they become dead!

Why don't I stop living in a world where I'm useless?

What good can I do for others by being alive?

My beloved ones.

If I cannot wish to die, I long to live, not for my own happiness, but because I know how much you all love me.

Dad! Mom! Sisters!

Everyone who is most important to me.

Does she love me? Really?

Yes, no, yes, no, no, yes—”

(From Chopin's album, Stuttgart, after September 8, 1831)

Perhaps it was precisely because Chopin was alone, away from his homeland, facing life and death and thinking intensely of his family, friends and loved ones, that he was able to write such a bittersweet melody.

On the recording of this album

The instrument I played for the recording of this album is the Bösendorfer Imperial model known as "Blissful Pianissimo."
The Imperial model from Bösendorfer, one of the world's three major piano manufacturers, has 97 keys while a regular piano has 88 keys, and is characterized by black keys called an extended bass.
Renowned for having the largest range of any modern piano, this piano has a deeper resonance and is highly expressive, producing a tone that is most beautiful when played pianissimo.

For me, pianissimo is the lifeblood of a performance, and I have always been searching for ways to produce a beautiful pianissimo. Now, I am pleased to be able to perform works by Chopin, who is said to have been an unparalleled performer of beautiful pianissimo, on this Imperial, making this a very happy recording.

I wanted to express the peace of mind that is the main concept of this album, so I tried to express Chopin's heart by singing the melody at a slow tempo, using beautiful pianissimos and cherishing each note.
Then, based on inspiration that arose from the planning stage through production, we came up with a new title and inserted original songs between the songs.

At the end of August, when the album is released, I will visit the factory on the outskirts of Vienna, the birthplace of Bösendorfer pianos.
I look forward to sharing with you in my next report the sounds that flow through the fingertips of the pianos from this utopia where the perfect newborn pianos, brought to life by the hands of the maestros, seem to blend in with the trees of the Vienna Woods and breathe comfortably.

Yuko Toyoda

Profile

Yuko Toyoda
A graduate of Kunitachi College of Music, she made her debut at the Vienna Konzerthaus in 2002. Since then, she has performed with the principal players of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, and has since begun her career as a soloist both in Japan and abroad. She is currently attracting attention as a rare pianist who is creating a new world of classical music with her beautiful, clear tone, passionate virtuosity, and show-style stage performances.

<Product information>
Total 15 songs/approx. 65 minutes
Price: ¥1,800 (excluding tax)
Product number: DLDH-1908
Composition, arrangement and performance: Yuko Toyoda (piano)

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