The Studies on Chopin's Études are a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's études by Leopold Godowsky, composed between 1894 and 1914. They are renowned for their technical difficulty: critic Harold C. Schonberg called them "the most impossibly difficult things ever written for the piano." Several of the studies (for example, the study "Ignis Fatuus" on Chopin's Étude in A minor, Op. 10, No. 2) put the original right-hand part into the left hand; several others are for the left hand alone (for example, the study on the "Revolutionary" Étude, transposed to C♯ minor). Two of the studies even combine two études; the better known of these, called "Badinage," combines both the G♭ (the "Black Key" Étude of Op. 10 and the "Butterfly" étude of Op. 25).
The number of studies is often given as 54, with Op. 25, No. 2 having one study written as a considerably different ossia of another; a similar ossia also exists for one of the studies on Op. 25, No. 3, so the total number of studies can be taken to be 55. In contrast, Godowsky's original numbering scheme runs only to 48.
There are no studies of this étude in the collection.
An additional number of studies have been documented, but all got omitted from the final list,[1][2] three of them had been found,[2][3] fragmented and incomplete. Due to these changes and the discovery of the unfinished studies, it is believed that there are over a dozen studies that were composed but not published. Godowsky told Grover Ackley Brower, an assistant editor at Carl Fischer, that there were 12 to 15 unpublished Studies.[2] Godowsky's secretary, John George Hinderer, wrote that Godowsky had ten manuscripts left in Vienna at the outbreak of World War I.[2] Examining the studies that were included in the 1903 and 1909 lists that were ultimately removed from the final collection, the following studies were either completed, unfinished or conceptualized:
Opus 10 No. 2
Opus 10 No. 5
Opus 10 No. 11
Opus 25 No. 6
Opus 25 No. 7
Opus 25 No. 8
Opus 25 No. 10
Opus 25 No. 12
Study (No. 49)
Op. 25 No. 4 and Op. 25 No. 11 combined (Listed as "No. 49" in the 1903 and 1909 lists. Hinderer also mentions its existence.) [listed in early series, but not published]
Opus 25 No. 3
2nd Study (No. 30a) in D♯ minor ("Marsch (March)")[2]
Nouvelle Étude No. 1
Study (No. 44a) in F minor (Variational form,[2] completed by Marc-André Hamelin[3])
Study in A minor (No. 50)
Op. 10 No. 2, Op. 25 No. 4 and Op. 25 No. 11 (Combined in one study)[2]
Recordings
There's a couple of recordings on the March and Study 50,[4][5] though there is no live recording for now. Hamelin has a recording of his own version of Study 44a.[6]
Only four pianists, Geoffrey Douglas Madge, Carlo Grante, Marc-André Hamelin, and Emanuele Delucchi have recorded the entire set of the studies. Francesco Libetta (1994, 1995, 2018), Carlo Grante (1995) and Emanuele Delucchi (2018) have performed the complete set in concert, but only Libetta has done so from memory. Francesco Libetta performed them again in Miami on July 7, 2018, in two recitals in the same day, one in the afternoon and one in the evening, also all of them by memory.[7] Emanuele Delucchi performed the complete set in one afternoon in Cagliari on September 19, 2024.[8] Ivan Ilić has made a speciality of the 22 études for the left hand alone.
Only a few other pianists have ventured to record selected studies. The first was Vladimir de Pachmann, who recorded the Study on Op. 10, No. 12 in 1912.[9] Others include Boris Berezovsky, Michel Beroff, Jorge Bolet, Robert Goldsand, Ian Hobson,[10] Ivan Ilić, David Saperton, Victor Schiøler, Jacob Jettomersky, and David Stanhope.[11]