Zygmunt Noskowski

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Zygmunt Noskowski born (May 2, 1846 in Warsaw, died. July 23, 1909 in Warsaw), Polish Composer, Conductor and teacher.

Zygmunt Noskowski (1846-1909) was born in Warsaw and was originally trained at the Warsaw Conservatory studying violin and composition. A scholarship enabled him to travel to Berlin where between 1864 and 1867, he studied with Friedrich Kiel, one of Europe’s leading teachers of composition. After holding several positions abroad, Noskowski returned to Warsaw in 1880 where he remained for the rest of his life.

He worked not only as a composer, but also became a famous teacher, a prominent conductor and a journalist. He was one of the leading figures in Polish music during the late 19th century and the first decade of the 20th. He taught virtually of all the important Polish composers of the next generation, including Karol Szymanowki and Grzegorz Fitelberg. He is considered today to be the first Polish symphonic composer and served as head of the Warsaw Music Society from 1880 to 1902 and was considered Poland’s leading composer during the last decade of his life.

While Noskowski is best known for his orchestral compositions, he composed opera, chamber music, instrumental sonatas and vocal works of importance. Discussing Nowkowski's chamber music, the famous critic and scholar Wilhelm Altmann wrote that it was "very effective and deserving of public attention and performance." Judging from the piano quartet written in 1879, one can hear that Noskowski had assimilated the recent musical developments taking place in Central Europe but the music, other than structurally, shows little or no influence of any of the major composers of the time, such as Brahms, Liszt, or Wagner, who were then dominating the scene.

[edit] List of Selected Works

Symphony No.1 in A Major, WoO (1874-1875)
Morskie Oko Concert Overature for Orchestra Op. 19
Symphony No.2 "Elegiac"
A Polish Elegy for Orchestra in e minor (1885)
The Steppe, a symphonic poem, Op. 66
March funebre for orchestra, Op. 53 [1897)
Symphony No.3 in F Major, "From Spring to Spring, WoO (1903)
Symphonic Variations on Chopin's Prelude, Op.28 No.7
Livia Quintilla, an opera (1898)
Wyrok (The Judgment), an opera
Zemsta za mur granicmy (Revenge of the Boundary Wall), an opera
String Quartet (1875)
Fantasy for String Quartet (1879)
Piano Quartet in d minor, Op.8 (1880)

[edit] References

Wronski, Witold, Zygmunt Noskowski, Warsaw 1960
Sutkowski, A, Zygmunt Noskowski, Krakow, 1957
Altmann, Wilhelm, Handbuch fûr Streichquartettspieler, Heinrichshofen, Amsterdam, 1972

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