Allegro de Concert (Chopin) - Transcriptions

Transcriptions

Some attempts have been made to score the Allegro de concert for piano and orchestra as probably originally intended by Chopin. Jean Louis Nicodé produced two versions—one for two pianos, and a later one for piano and orchestra—but he added various parts of his own creation, amounting to 70 bars of new music (a development section after bar 205, a third tutti, etc.). He also "beefs up" the piano part towards the end. This version was first played by the Dutch pianist Marie Geselschap in New York, with an orchestra conducted by Anton Seidl.

In the early 1930s, Kazimierz Wiłkomirski made another orchestration that was faithful to Chopin's published score. The world premiere recording of this version was by Michael Ponti with the Berlin Symphony Orchestra under Völker Schmidt-Gertenbach.

The Australian pianist Alan Kogosowski went further. In addition to restructuring and augmenting Chopin's music for the Allegro de concert into a new treatment for piano and orchestra, he also created settings for piano and orchestra of the Nocturne in C-sharp minor, Op. posth. "Lento con gran espressione", and the Bolero in C major-A minor, Op. 19. Kogosowski put these together as a three-movement work and performed it under the misleading title of "Chopin's Piano Concerto No. 3 in A major" on 8 October 1999, with the Detroit Symphony Orchestra under Neeme Järvi.