Chopin Residue is a series of multi-media works by Polish artist and former indie rock musician Mariusz Szypura.
One part is a collection of ‘deconstructions’ of Chopin’s music, featuring the likes of Adrian Utley, Lee Ranaldo, Justin Meldal-Johnsen, John McEntire and many others. These pieces range from the ethereal, fleeting tones of ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 20’ (with Charlie Draper on ondes Martenot and Theremin) to the ferocious guitar-heavy ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 22’ with Ranaldo and saxophonist Zoh Amba, wherein strings emerge only to be battered down into submission. ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 4’, with Utley, drummer Joey Waronker and thereminist Carolyn Eyck sounds like it belongs on Utley’s first Portishead album, with its chunky jazz rhythms and shimmering, maudlin guitar and electronic textures.
On the deconstruction of ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 2’, Szypura presents Chopin’s mellifluous arpeggios as a snarling web of grubby synth sequences, offset by rigid drumming by John Stanier, feisty guitars from Sugar Yoshinaga and Draper’s electronics. ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 15’ features jangly guitar from Ranaldo, measured kitwork from Stanier, and an array of tuned percussion from Milosz Pękala, the sum of whose parts is a long, hazy, psychedelic piece framed by the tracest outlines of classical melodicism.
Another part of this collection is a series of ‘reworks’ by Fennesz, Jim O’Rourke, Matthew Herbert, Christine Ott and others, which you are encouraged to play simultaneously with the deconstructions, if you happen to own two turntables.
Herbert’s version of ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 22’ hitches sprinkles of Chopin’s piano to a dubby rhythm track, while Adrian Utley reimagines ‘Étude Op. 25 No. 12’ as a bouncy electronic wonderland complete with delicate, flute-like melodic gestures. Fennesz introduces skipping electronics and oscillating guitar to his version of ‘Berceuse Op. 57’, in the process turning the piece into a vibrant, unpredictable, becalming soundscape. Sean O’Hagan takes ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 4’ and renders it as skipping, fragmented leftfield electro, while Jim O’Rourke subjects ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 2’ to heavy reverb and phasing, the result of which sounds like an orchestra tuning up.
Christine Ott floods ‘Nocturne Op. 72 No. 1’ with layers of beatific ondes Martenot, an extension of her own prowess and practice as a solo artist and in the Snowdrops ensemble. Benoît Pioulard’s version of ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 9’ is constructed entirely from layers of sensitively-arranged drones and swirling cycles of guitar feedback, while Abul Mogard approaches ‘Prelude Op. 28 No. 15’ as an opportunity to offer up a web of edgy, modular synth drones and white noise textures, through which occasionally poke amorphous elements from the piece on the deconstructions disc.
The process of lathe-cutting the vinyl albums of deconstructions and reworks yielded a third part of the collection, in the form of large circular artworks constructed using the plastic residues from the lathe process. Pure white and of varying textures – from fluffy and whispy to brittle, razor sharp and angular – these pieces were installed in the Fridman Gallery on New York’s Bowery between November 2 and November 9 2025. On one level, these pieces may be a comment on wastefulness; in another sense, they are no different from either the deconstructed Chopin pieces or their reworks, for they are entirely new structures arising from something else.
The final element of the collection was a live event in the Fridman Gallery surrounded by the artworks. For this thirty-minute performance to effectively kick off the brief exhibition, Szypura was joined by Ranaldo, Amba and Stanier. The small stage was so cramped that Ranaldo had to climb over an amp to get into position, while Amba played on the floor in the front row of the audience. Animated videos of the artworks – another discrete element of the overall Chopin Residue project – bathed the shadowy forms of the players in soft light, as if to draw your attention away from their playing.
That was often hard to do with Ranaldo, who was here at his most intense and restless. He strikes his guitar with a drum-stick, bows the strings to produce squeals of feedback and taps the neck of the guitar against the gallery wall. Rarely did he ever settle into playing his guitar straight – that was Szypura’s job. At one point, his pressing of the guitar neck against the wall prompted one of Szypura’s circular artworks to vibrate in sympathy. It’s as if he is both unplaying the guitar and playing the artworks – and the building – simultaneously.
His guitar is loud, wild and freighted with heavy distortion. These are the moments where Stanier’s drumming becomes less rigid, more loose, and Amba’s saxophone takes on the wild intensity of an avenue full of angry New York cab drivers during rush-hour. To Ranaldo’s right, Szypura alternated between steady, rhythmic guitar playing and inchoate electronics.
A second movement begins with a quiet pulse and drones formed from the residues of the distortion from the first movement. As the piece progresses, it gathers intensity. Stanier’s drumming becomes increasingly firm, rejecting the tentative drum machine beat that opened the piece and guiding it toward a noisy, apocalyptic crescendo filled with layers of intense overlapping guitar work and terrifying sax dissonance.
“After one has played a vast quantity of notes, it is simplicity that emerges as the crowning reward of art,” Chopin is quoted as saying. Szypura’s multi-faceted project is far from simple. It stands as an ambitious, engaging and complex enterprise, and one that illustrates how one source idea can result in many creative tributaries.
Chopin Residue is released November 28 by Black Element.
With thanks to Nico.
Words: Mat Smith
(c) 2025 Further.
Further. 
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