This first etude is a study for right-hand arpeggios in extraordinary wide strechtes, built on a firm melody in the bass. In the first two bars of this study the sweeping arpeggios employ more than five octaves of the keyboard.

According to Vladimir Horowitz, this is the most difficult Etude .

Hans von Bülow declares that "the requisite suppleness of the hand in gradual extension and rapid contraction will be most quickly attained if the player does not disdain first of all to impress on the individual fingers the chord which is the foundation of each arpeggio"

Theodore Kullak writes of it: "Above a ground bass proudly and boldly striding along, flow mighty waves of sound. The etude--whose technical end is the rapid execution of widely extended chord figurations exceeding the span of an octave--is to be played on the basis of forte throughout. With sharply dissonant harmonies the forte is to be increased to fortissimo, diminishing again with consonant ones. Pithy accents! Their effect is enhanced when combined with an elastic recoil of the hand."

James Huneker:" This study is the key with which Chopin unlocked--not his heart, but the kingdom of technique."

The musical qualities and technical demands of these studies were not immediately understood by Chopin's contemporaries.The German critic Heinrich Rellstab (1799 - 1860) demonstrated this lack of understanding when he sarcastically advised his readers to have a surgeon close by when practising these works: "Those who have distorted fingers may put them right by practising these studies; but those who have not, should not play them, at least not without having a surgeon at hand."