The Mazurka in B major, placed second in the set published as Op. 41, was composed probably at Nohant, although doubts have been raised about this, since it bears a trace of the sojourn on Majorca, where the first work of Op. 41 was written. Wilhelm von Lenz noted what Chopin apparently said about this work, namely that the opening bars portray the sound of guitar chords. They are followed by a quasi-oberek complement, which seems to answer the call of those chords. Lenz also noted a hint regarding performance: ‘The first four bars and their repetitions’, said Chopin, ‘are to be played in the style of a guitar prelude, progressively quickening the tempo’.[i]It is not easy to define the ethnic provenance of the music that fills the middle section of the B major Mazurka. It is possible that Mazovian and Majorcan rhythms and intonations momentarily merged here in Chopin’s imagination.Author: Mieczysław TomaszewskiA series of programmes entitled ‘Fryderyk Chopin's Complete Works’Polish Radio 2 [i] Quoted in Jean-Jacques Eigeldinger, Chopin: pianist and teacher as seen by his pupils, tr. Naomi Shohet with Krysia Osostowicz and Roy Howat, ed. Roy Howat (Cambridge, 1986), 76.