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JOAQUÍNACHÚCARRO 17 Reading Luciano González Sarmiento’s excellent biography of you, 1 we discover that Chopin was not only a very early presence in your world, but also to a large extent lay at the origin of your musical vocation . . . Chopin is a very old acquaintance of mine, andmention of himtakesme back tomy early childhood. My father, an ophthalmologist by profession, was a good amateur pianist. Alongside Schumann, Brahms, Chabrier, Rachmaninoff and Mussorgsky, he often played Chopin. In the evening, when he came back from his clinic and I was already in bed, he would sit at the piano to relax. His repertory included the ‘Heroic’ Polonaise in A flat major, some waltzes and preludes, and also some of the études. I was immediately captivated by the beauty and strength of this music and I remember that my older brother and I had fun imagining stories about certain pieces. Then came the time for piano studies at the Bilbao Conservatory. The first works by Chopin I played there were the Tarantella (another piece my father played), the First Impromptu and a few études, which were set pieces for the final exam. 1. Luciano González Sarmiento, Joaquín Achúcarro desde el piano (Madrid: EditorialAlpuerto, 2002).