Chopin looked back and evoked for us the story of his life in 24 Preludes. Through the medium of these works he revealed his deepest fears and sorrows, but also the beauty and integrity of his heart. The story of these ghosts culminates in tolling bells which are, in Cortot's words, "of blood, of earthly pleasure, of death..." But what follows? A pause: silence, timeless solitude, in the Etude Op. 10, No. 6. Then, suddenly, the soul wakes up and waltzes into space. The album ends with the Scherzo No. 2 "like a charnel house," or the house of the dead, as Chopin apparently described the opening- yet the finale sounds like a celebration of life. And so our ghostly journey ends with fireworks, with smiling and shining, looking far into the future..."