The soloist this time was Cuban-born, American-trained Horacio Gutiérrez. His vehicle was Chopin's "Piano Concerto No. 1," intended as one of the works with which the young Chopin hoped to win international fame as both performer and composer. Its orchestral writing is banal and mostly perfunctory, no better than what was common in piano concertos of the 1820s and 1830s. Indeed, much of the time the orchestra could be dispensed with, and the majority of the piano part could easily be broken up into completely self-sufficient solo pieces. What makes us cherish the work is its foreshadowing of Chopin's great output of piano pieces to come. If he had died prematurely in 1830, not achieving that later legacy, would we take this labored concerto so seriously now?

Musical performances
Orchestras