Release Date: 31 July 2003
Label: Marco Polo
Packaging Type: Jewel Case
No of Units: 1
Barcode: 636943518724
Genres: Classical
Composer/Series: GODOWSKY
Description
Leopold Godowsky (1870-1938) Piano Music Volume 6: Schubert TranscriptionsThe great Polish-American pianist Leopold Godowsky was bornat Soshly, a village near the Lithuanian city of Vilnius, in 1870, the son of adoctor. The first signs of his exceptional musical ability were clear by theage of three and he wrote his first compositions four years later, in 1879making his first public appearance as a pianist. There followed a series ofconcerts in Germany and Poland and a very short period of study with ErnstRudorff, a pupil of Clara Schumann and of Moscheles, at the Berlin Musikhochschule.Four months at the Hochschule proved enough and in the same year, 1884,Godowsky made his first appearance in the United States in Boston, under theauspices of the Clara Louise Kellogg Concert Company, then touring with thatsinger and with the singer Emma Thursby. 1885 brought appearances at the NewYork Casino, in weekly alternation with the Venezuelan pianist Teresa Carreno,and the following year he undertook a tour of Canada with the Belgian violinistOvide Musin, for whom Saint-Sa?½ns had written his Morceau de Concert. In thehope of studying with Liszt, Godowsky returned to Europe, but, learning of thelatter's death from a newspaper, he travelled, instead, to Paris, with theobject of studying with Camille Saint-Sa?½ns, distinguished equally as a pianistand a composer. Saint-Sa?½ns was impressed by Godowsky's playing and suggestedthat he should adopt him, on condition that he changed his name, a suggestionthat Godowsky rejected. For the better part of three years, however, their relationshipcontinued, with Sundays spent together, Godowsky playing to Saint-Sa?½ns, beforethe latter played to his disciple his own compositions. The contact was avaluable one and allowed Godowsky to meet leading figures in contemporarymusical life, including Tchaikovsky, whose music he played in that composer'spresence at the Paris chamber-music society, La Trompette. In 1927, six yearsafter the death of Saint-Sa?½ns, Godowsky transcribed for piano his mentor's LaCygne (The Swan), from the Carnival of the Animals, and on his own deathbed in1938 had a friend play this to him. In 1890 Godowsky returned to America, where he joined thestaff of the New York College of Music, married, and took out Americancitizenship. While continuing his career as a performer, he visitedPhiladelphia in 1894 and 1895, as the head of the piano department at the musicschool founded by Gilbert Raynold Combs, and from 1895 to 1900 led the pianodepartment of the Chicago Conservatory. A successful concert in Berlin persuadedhim to settle there in the latter year, teaching and using the city as his basefor concert tours throughout Europe and the Near East. In 1909 he moved toVienna to direct the piano master-class at the Akademie der Tonkunst.There were American tours between 1912 and 1914 and with theoutbreak of war Godowsky settled again in the United States, giving concertsand clarifying his innovative theories
Tracklisting
Walter Hofbauer; Czech Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra Pardubice ; Marek Stilec
SLOVAK STATE PO:POLLACK
Nuremberg Phil Chor/Kvso
Danubius Quartet
Walter:Budapest Strauss Symp O
Various Artists
New Budapest Quartet:Prunyi
Duarte:Slovak Radio Symphony
