The third Mazurka in the opus 17 set was composed in the key of A flat major, common in Chopin, including in the mazurkas. It brings the co-existence of what was heard and adopted from folk music with what is original and individual.The dance is framed by music that cannot be named. What we have before us is the modification and repetition of an opening motif built from the pendular motion of a couple of major seconds. The subsequent bars bring a contrastive music, with a wilful oberek accentuation. The trio, in E major, brightens the situation with the distinctiveness of the vigorously led melody and dance rhythms heard in Cuiavia. The music that is interrupted for a moment by that rocking melody of the trio surprises us with its sudden contrast. It brings a series of sonorities, which Marceli Antoni Szulc calls ‘the imitation of the rasping of country fiddlers’.The Mazurka in A flat major is not an easy work. The key to its interpretation would appear to lie in grasping that atmosphere – somewhat surreal, on the boundary of dream and reality.Author: Mieczysław TomaszewskiA series of programmes entitled ‘Fryderyk Chopin's Complete Works’Polish Radio 2