Frédéric Chopin

Frédéric Chopin was a composer and pianist of the Romantic era, born near Warsaw in what was then the Duchy of Warsaw to a French father and Polish mother, and raised in Congress Poland. A child prodigy, he trained in Warsaw before leaving in 1830, settling permanently in Paris from 1831, where he taught, performed in salons rather than large halls, and composed almost exclusively for solo piano. His output includes nocturnes, études, preludes, mazurkas, polonaises, ballades, scherzos, and sonatas, many drawing on Polish forms. He maintained a long relationship with the writer George Sand, spending winters and summers in Mallorca and Nohant. In 1848 he toured the British Isles, giving his final public performance in London on 16 November 1848 before returning to Paris. In frail health for years, he died in Paris in 1849.