Composers have always written etudes (studies), instrumental pieces designed for the learner. But etudes gained new currency in Chopin's days, a direct result of general prosperity and rising bourgeois class. It's like this: industrial and economic activity is on the rise; more and more folks have leisure time, as well as the education and the extra money to support an interest in more refined modes of entertainment (cable TV was not yet available); they spend an occasional evening at a local salon (Paris in 1840 had as many as 850 of them). At these "cocktail parties" of the day they are blown away by a virtuoso pianist (like Chopin) and rush out the next day to pick up a piano and his latest sheet music hits. They take piano lessons and are instructed to develop their chops through the purchase and practice of various etudes.
The etudes of Chopin and his contemporaries addressed the pianistic pyrotechnics of the new virtuosity: scales, arpeggios, octave runs, thirds and sixths, impossible chords, you name it. Can you guess the pedagogic purpose behind this "Revolutionary Etude?" The title, by the way, is not a tribute to the pianistic revolution Chopin spearheaded, but to the 1831 Polish insurrection against the Russians. Don't let the term "etude" fool you; Chopin's learning pieces are good for more than finger stretching. They've earned their place in the heady realm of Art Music, suitable for the concert hall as well as the practice room.
