An unknown composition written by Friedrich Chopin almost 200 years ago has been discovered in the vault of the Morgan Library and Museum in New York.
The score with Chopin's signature was found last spring by a curator, the New York Times reports.
"I thought, 'What's going on here? What could this be?'. I didn't recognize the music," curator Robinson McClellan told the paper.
At first he wasn't sure if the composition was really Chopin's, after he photographed the score and played it on the keyboard at home.
He consulted with a University of Pennsylvania academic, an expert on the Polish composer, before the Morgan Museum confirmed the authenticity after testing the ink and paper.
The handwriting was also found to match Chopin's, including a stylized bass clef sign as well as Chopin's characteristic scribbles.
"We are absolutely confident in our conclusion," McClellan said.
The discovery could spark debate in the world of classical music, where reports of unearthed masterpieces are sometimes met with skepticism and history records the occurrence of forgeries and fake manuscripts, writes the New York Times.
Newly discovered works by Chopin, who died in 1849 at the age of 39, are very rare. Although he is one of the favorite composers in the world of music - his heart, preserved in alcohol, is kept in a church in Warsaw - he was less prolific than many other composers, writing about 250 compositions, almost all for solo piano.
The museum believes the music dates from between 1830 and 1835, when Chopin was in his early twenties.
The composition has a striking introduction, and pianist Lang Lang described it as "a dramatic darkness that turns into something positive".
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