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Chopin - Dances with drums and harps

Chopin is one of the most popular classical composer on the internet and there are quite a number of good quality anonymous MIDI sequences available.

These tracks were all sequenced with a combination of steel drums and harps of various kinds and in a couple of cases a Moog bass synthesizer was added to round out the mix. Dance music of this kind fits well with this percussive instrumentation. I had come across the benefits of the combination with the harp while following in Emerson Lake and Palmer's footsteps and putting new instrumentation on Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. When you thinkabout how the piano is constructed it makes a certain kind of sense.

Several different harps were used including the celtic harp which is a particularly effective emulation - quite different from the harp sounds that were available from my Roland or other software synths. The dances selected have a strong rythmic element which make them much more suitable for this treatment than some of Chopin's more thoughtfull or lyrical pieces.

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