The stirring strains of Frederic Chopin's music are reverberating across the world as music lovers celebrate the composer's 200th birthday this year -- from the château of his French lover to Egypt's pyramids and even into space.But nowhere do celebrations carry the powerful sense of national feeling as they do in Poland, the land of his birth, where his heroic, tragic piano compositions are credited with capturing the country's soul.
"Fryderyk Chopin is a Polish icon," said Andrzej Sulek, director of the Fryderyk Chopin Institute in Warsaw. "In Polish culture there is no other figure who is as well-known in the world and who represents Polish culture so well."
Perhaps nothing better conveys Chopin's importance -- literally -- than his heart. It is preserved like a relic in an urn of alcohol in a Warsaw church.
Read more:http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-chopin26-2010feb26,0,6774498.story
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