During the Holocaust

On September 23, 1939, Polish-Jewish pianist Władysław Szpilman's performance of Chopin's Nocturne in C-sharp minor, which was being broadcast live on Polskie Radio, was interrupted by the German invasion of Warsaw. Later, during the final months of World War II, German army officer Wilm Hosenfeld discovered Szpilman hiding in an abandoned house in the Warsaw Ghetto, which had been destroyed during the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. When Szpilman described himself as a pianist, Hosenfeld asked him to play something on the house's grand piano. Szpilman chose to play the Nocturne in C-sharp minor, after which Hosenfeld protected Szpilman and gave him food to survive.[10].

At the Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp, Nazi commandant Amon Goeth ordered the imprisoned Jewish pianist Natalia Karp to perform for his birthday. She chose Chopin's Nocturne in C-sharp minor because it was melancholy enough to describe her feelings. She played so well that Goeth spared her life, and that of her sister.[11][12]

In 2002, director Roman Polanski dramatized the radio station's final live broadcast in The Pianist, which was based on Szpilman's memoirs; however, he changed the piece that was played to Chopin's Ballade No. 1 in G minor, Op. 23.