Chopin’s grave in Paris remains a place of pilgrimage and his music continues to sell out concert halls worldwide – but who exactly was this astonishing man? He was terrified of public performance; he fled his Polish homeland for Paris never to return; he took up with the most notorious transvestite in France and, despite a life of ill-health, wrote some of the deepest and most powerful music ever written? How exactly did a young Polish boy rise to such heady heights?

For four years, Phil Grabsky has traveled the globe in his quest to lay bare the life and music of Chopin. By talking to acclaimed musical historians such as Jeremy Siepmann and bringing to the screen performances by such esteemed musicians as Leif Ove Andsnes, Daniel Barenboim, Ronald Brautigam, Kevin Kenner, and Lars Vogt, he hopes to answer those questions.

Renowned stage and screen star Juliet Stevenson provides narration. David Dawson brings life to the letters of Chopin himself.