Warsaw Chopin City Tour

Warsaw. Saxon Palace.

Currently, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

The only surviving after the War part of the Saxon Palace.

In the nineteenth century, the palace was the seat of the Warsaw Lyceum and the teacher of the French language and French literature there was a father of Frederick - Nicholas.

Chopin family lived in a modest apartment in the right wing of the building.

Young Frederick since childhood developed his musical talent and his own technique of playing piano.

Despite initial opposition from music teacher - he hit the keyboard with those fingers, which was most comfortable for him, and not those that have been recommended by textbooks.

In addition, Chopin's fingers were extremely long which allowed him to easily cover the 10 keys of piano (the width of one key is 22.5 millimeter).

A viewer from that time describing Chopin's hands while playing, wrote that they extended, stretched, and embraced one-third of the keyboard and it looked like the mouth of a snake swallowing prey.

Warsaw. Radziwill Palace.

Fryderyk Chopin began playing piano at the age of 4 years.

Teacher:

"Technique took you very little time. Your fingers got tired less than the mind. Other spent whole days, twiddled fingers on the keyboard, you rarely spent one hours with it."

At the age of 6, he started composing to, at the age of 8 years, give the first recital in the Radziwiłł Palace.

Participant of the evening:

"There was plenty of people [...] Over the evening played piano young Chopin, the child in the eighth year of his life, promising as experts say, replace Mozart."

Fryderyk Chopin, after finished concert, when his mother asked what the audience liked the most, he answered resolutely:

My lace collar.

Warsaw. Church of the Holy Cross.

The place where is placed the heart of Chopin.

The body was buried in Paris at Père-Lachaise cemetery.

In 2014, Polish scientists opened the crypt in the church of the Holy Cross to check condition of the heart of the composer.

The jar with a spirit pickle in which floats the organ was in perfect condition and has not been depressurized for over 160 years.

Scientists have confirmed a change of heart caused by tuberculosis and heart failure.

Unfortunately, it failed to investigate it by CT scan or take samples for genetic research.

All were opposed to do this.

Starting with a great-great-granddaughter one of the sisters of Chopin, through director of the National Institute of Chopin, to the cardinal in charge of the parish.

Therefore imposed only an extra layer of beeswax to secure the bonding layer between a lid and the jar against pairing and agreed on the next inspection of Chopin's heart for 50 years.

Warsaw. Ostrogski Palace.

It is the center of the small district of Chopin.

Next to the Chopin Museum is here the Chopin Institute and the Academy of Music.

The museum is located on four floors of the Ostrogski Palace, and each floor is related with another period of Chopin's life.

A visitor individually decides about tour route, so a visit to the museum every time is different. In addition, in the building can not be more than 50 visitors, what allowing you to decide yourself at which the exhibits to stop for a long time, and which to skip. An interactive learning of Chopin's music is not only based on the picture and sound but also on the smell.

And in front of the Ostrogski Palace is a monument of Golden Duck living in an underground lake.

According to legend, the duck gave 100 ducats for poor boy, who, to become a rich man, had to spend money only on himself. But the boy had a golden heart and gave the money to a pauper and the spell was broken.

The boy still was poor. The pauper took over the property and he had not a thought to share with anyone.

What none of the politically correct legends does not mention.