Here’s a pub quiz classical conundrum: what do Chopin’s recently rediscovered Waltz in A minor, the flute quartets of the 19th-century Danish composer Dag Henrik Esrum-Hellerup (1803-91) and Liszt’s late piano piece Grübelei have in common? The answer (as you may have guessed) is that the authenticity of all three have been seriously questioned. Of Esrum-Hellerup’s status there can at least be no doubt. Despite the appearance of an entry on this great Dane in the first printing of the 1980 New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, expertly penned by musicologist Robert Layton, he is an entirely fictitious character, conjured up by Layton himself as a humorous hoax. The nobly hyphenated surname is a combination of two Danish railway stations; Hellerup’s alleged enthusiasm for the works of Wagner and Draeseke is as fictitious as his flute quartets. The strait‑laced editor of The New Grove, Stanley Sadie, was reportedly apoplectic on uncovering Layton’s prank. He quickly consigned the hapless Hellerup to the cutting-room floor for the second printing of the dictionary. Layton, however, was unrepentant, declaring with glee ever after that he remained ‘the sole authority on the Danish composer Esrum-Hellerup’!

Liszt’s Grübelei (‘Meditation’) is an altogether more curious case. This is quite literally a ‘posthumous’ piece, supposedly dictated by the spirit of Liszt in 1969, long after his death in 1886, to the English medium Rosemary Brown (1916-2001). Although Mrs Brown claimed to have enjoyed only a rudimentary musical training as a child, a host of ghosts manifested themselves to message their post-final thoughts, including Chopin, Rachmaninov and almost everyone else you’ve ever heard of (lesser composers were clearly at the back of the queue). Liszt was her favourite ghost by far. He would appear at random, a kindly figure in abbé’s robes, and act as mentor as well as musician. One day he even helped her choose the best bunch of bananas in a supermarket. Liszt hadn’t been known as an inveterate bargain-hunter during his lifetime, from 1811 to 1886, but there’s nothing to stop a spirit taking up new hobbies in retirement. However, what makes the story more than just a tale of harmless delusion is that Grübelei actually sounds like a decent example of late Liszt (you can hear several performances of it online) – convincingly so, even to Liszt’s biographer Humphrey Searle, who was truly puzzled by the whole affair. The argument over whether Rosemary Brown was a conscious fake, an unconscious fraud or a genuine medium still rages, if at low volume.

To return to earth: Chopin’s ‘lost’ Waltz in A minor manifested itself not in a séance, but in the more mundane setting of the Pierpont Morgan Library in New York. Staff stumbled upon the modest manuscript – it’s only the size of a birthday card – in 2019, while cataloguing a bequest. It was eventually made public, with great fanfare, in 2024, through a feature in The New York Times. International media latched on to the story, and Chopin was suddenly in the news. Nevertheless, some have questioned how newsworthy the waltz really is, whether it is in fact by Chopin, and whether it is actually a ‘piece’ at all, or simply a sketch. As can be guessed from the minuscule manuscript, this is no Fourth Sonata or Fifth Ballade, merely a slender fragment of 24 bars. Even performed, as indicated, with a repeat of the whole, it lasts little more than a minute. Other aspects of the manuscript do appear to check out: it seems to be written in the composer’s hand (apart from the word ‘Chopin’ scribbled over the score) and it’s on the type of paper used by the composer in the early 1830s. There is one strikingly odd feature, namely a triple-forte dynamic in the first few bars of the piece. Such a marking is rare in Chopin, although it does occasionally occur (for example, at the end of the First Ballade), but it’s jarringly unexpected in an otherwise delicate dance.

Of course, these issues had already crossed the minds of the Morgan Library curators. They had sensibly spent some of the time between 2019 and 2024 consulting the ‘usual suspects’ of Chopin studies. The consensus was that the waltz is authentic, but it may be an extract of or a sketch for a larger work, and/or an independent album leaf penned as a present. Album leaves were produced with great profusion in the 19th century. They acted as mementos and gifts – in other words, this could really be some sort of birthday card. If you’d like to find out more, I recommend a fascinating podcast – chopinpodcast.com/episode-7-the-new-waltz – in which Alan Walker argues a sceptical case for the prosecution (is this truly Chopin?), while John Rink and Jeffrey Kallberg present a cautious case for the defence (yes, it probably is).

But if the waltz isn’t by Chopin, who wrote it? Alan Walker suggests Julian Fontana (1810-69). He was Chopin’s copyist (with an almost identical hand) and a composer in his own right (with a similar musical style). Naturally, Walker brings up the nigh-on preposterous triple-forte as evidence. That undoubtedly is an odd dynamic for a tiny piece, but it isn’t necessarily a deal-breaker.

It’s relatively easy to copy a musical style – talented film composers do it all the time. It is the show-stoppingly unexpected moments that are the signs of genius. When I first heard Anthony Payne’s fabulous completion of Elgar’s Third Symphony, I was staggered by the stunning opening, swaggering defiantly in bare fifths, like a battleship buffeted by the ocean. ‘That’s fantastic,’ I thought, ‘but can it really be Elgar?’ I later discovered that it was one of the few sections of the symphony entirely finished in full score by the composer. Now, I’m well aware that this is the type of circular argument beloved of crazy conspiracy theorists. It’s probably Chopin because it sounds like Chopin; it’s even more likely to be Chopin if it doesn’t sound like Chopin. Quod erat demonstrandum! All I can offer here is my personal opinion, namely that I side more with Rink and Kallberg than I do with Walker. Barring new information, the issue must remain open.

I conclude with a cautionary tale: an elderly colleague of mine once developed a bizarre theory that Mozart’s last three symphonies had been consciously composed as a triptych with a carefully hidden esoteric meaning. ‘There’s no evidence for that at all,’ I countered. ‘Exactly!’, my colleague said triumphantly. ‘Mozart was covering his traces. And he had you fooled, didn’t he?’ In the wise words of Eric Morecambe, ‘there’s no answer to that’! IP

This feature originally appeared in the SPRING 2025 issue of International Piano