English Section

Musical tribute to Ignacy Jan Paderewski in Washington

16.10.2022 08:00
"Music from the Heart" is the motto of Sunday’s gala concert in Washington in tribute to Polish pianist, composer and statesman Ignacy Jan Paderewski.
Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 1890
Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Lawrence Alma-Tadema, 1890Photo: [Public domain]via Wikimedia Commons

The event features the  Smithsonian Chamber Orchestra under Kenneth Slovik in works by Polish and American composers.

In addition to Paderewski’s Romanza performed by American pianist Avery Gagliano, a semi-finalist of last year’s International Chopin Piano Competition, the programme of the concert includes Concerto for String Orchestra by Grażyna Bacewicz (1909-1969), Concerto-Notturno by Mikołaj Górecki,  Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings and  a Suite from Aaron Copland’s  Appalachian Spring.

Mikołaj Górecki, who is the son of the famous Polish composer Henryk Mikołaj Górecki, and is a resident of the United States, is to be in the audience.

The concert is organised jointly by the Smithsonian Chamber Music Society and the Andrzej Markowski Foundation. Andrzej Markowski was a prominent Polish conductor. He died in 1986.  It was Małgorzata Markowska, his daughter, who serves as the Foundation President, who first came up with the idea of staging the event.

The concert is held under the patronage of Marek Magierowski, the Polish Ambassador to the United States of America, as well as the honorary patronage of Piotr Gliński, Poland’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Culture and National Heritage. 

A legendary pianist, composer, philanthropist and politician, Paderewski is one of the household names in Polish culture and politics.

Hailed by his contemporaries as the greatest pianist since Franz Liszt, he  achieved the peak of his triumphant career at the turn of the 19th century. He also entered the annals of music history  as a talented composer. His opera Manru remains, to this day, the only Polish opera produced at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.

During World War I, Paderewski supported Poland’s attempts to regain independence after more than 120 years of foreign rule. In 1919, as Prime Minister and Foreign Affairs Minister, he co-chaired (with Roman Dmowski) the Polish delegation for the Peace Conference in Paris and signed the Treaty of Versailles.

Paderewski died in the United States in 1941 and, following a decision by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, was buried at Arlington Military Cemetery in Washington. In 1992, his remains were brought to Poland and buried at St John’s Cathedral in Warsaw.

(mk/ał)