Here’s the funny thing about … Chopin

Shortly before COVID-19 hit, comedian Aidan Jones picked up a keyboard a friend was giving away. When the lockdowns set in, his occasional tinkering evolved into a habit and soon reignited the passion that had once seen him contemplate a career as a classical pianist.

Now he has turned his love of 19th-century composer Frédéric Chopin into one of the year’s most unexpected comedy festival hits, Chopin’s Nocturne.

He’s described the show as “classical piano presented with jokes by a bald dickhead”, but it’s also a poignant work about connecting with art made in a very different time and place. It marvels at the sophistication and emotion in Chopin’s Nocturne in E Flat Major and makes the point his approach wasn’t so different from, say, today’s hip-hop stars.

Aidan Jones was inspired by a desire to share his enthusiasm for the music.Credit: Darren Keane

Performing in period regalia and a wig, Jones has toured the show in intimate rooms with a grand piano, echoing Chopin’s preference to play in salons rather than concert venues.

The comic was initially inspired by a desire to share his enthusiasm for the music.

“I knew no one was going to come to an Aidan Jones classical piano recital. That would be pretty self-indulgent,” he says.

“So I thought, what skill do I have that a lot of musicians don’t have? That’s the skill of getting on stage and making people understand and care about things that I care about that they don’t necessarily have experience in.

“Rather than applying that to situations or feelings in my life, which is what I’ve been doing in stand-up for 10 years, I thought, what if I apply that to the concepts that really excite me about this music?”

He became interested in combining Chopin and comedy when he played the music for friends who thought it was nice but not for them.

“They would kind of recoil and almost put [classical music] on a pedestal above themselves. A lot of my comedy comes from just talking to my friends and reading their reactions to things … in the show, I imagine the audience are close friends, and then I think: how can I get those people to get out of their own way and care about this music?”

Before writing Chopin’s Nocturne, Jones had been a regular on the festival circuit, but he became disillusioned with the show-a-year grind, feeling some of his work had been rushed. In 2024, he took a year off to slowly develop and refine this show.

“I started thinking about the financial imperatives that exist in the comedy system in Australia, especially because it’s such a small market,” he says.

“If you want to make money and have a following, you’re compelled to write a new show every year, tour it to the major cities, then chuck it all out and go again. At least for me, that’s not conducive to making great work, which is ultimately what I want to do.”

Jones worked with directors for the first time on Chopin’s Nocturnes. Actor and clown Casey Filips encouraged him to lean into the elements of physical comedy, particularly when he relates the bonkers tale of one of Chopin’s contemporaries who disguised himself as a woman and set off on a cross-country stagecoach journey to shoot dead his romantic rival.

Theatre director Delyth Jones also helped sharpen the show’s focus after seeing an early version in Edinburgh.

“She cut to the core [and said] what’s funny about this show is the juxtaposition between your loud, bombastic nature and the calm, beautiful piano playing, so let’s accentuate those things.”

Aidan Jones’ Chopin’s Nocturne is at Smith’s Alternative, Canberra on June 21, Church Street Studios, Sydney on June 22 and Comedy Republic, Melbourne on July 8 and 15.

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