Leopold Godowsky
Encyclopedia
Leopold Godowsky was a famed Polish American
Polish American
A Polish American , is a citizen of the United States of Polish descent. There are an estimated 10 million Polish Americans, representing about 3.2% of the population of the United States...

 pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...

, composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

, and teacher. One of the most highly regarded performers of his time, he became known for his theories concerning the application of relaxed weight and economy of motion in piano playing, principles later propagated by Godowsky's pupils, such as Heinrich Neuhaus
Heinrich Neuhaus
Heinrich Gustavovich Neuhaus was a Soviet pianist and pedagogue of German extraction. He taught at the Moscow Conservatory from 1922 to 1964. He was made a People's Artist of the RSFSR in 1956...

. Ferruccio Busoni
Ferruccio Busoni
Ferruccio Busoni was an Italian composer, pianist, editor, writer, piano and composition teacher, and conductor.-Biography:...

 famously observed that he and Godowsky were the only composers to have added anything of significance to keyboard writing since Liszt
Liszt
Liszt is a Hungarian surname. Notable persons with that surname include:* Franz Liszt , Hungarian composer and pianist* Adam Liszt , father of Franz Liszt* Anna Liszt , mother of Franz Liszt...

. As a composer, Godowsky became best known for his transcriptions of works by other composers. His best known work in the field is 53 Studies on Chopin's Études
Studies on Chopin's Etudes
The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's études. The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's études. The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's...

 (1894–1914).

Life

Leopold Godowsky was born to Jewish parents, Anna and Maciej Godowsky, in Żośle
Žasliai
Žasliai is a small town in Kaunas County in central Lithuania. As of 2001 it had a population of 818.-References:*This article was initially translated from the Lithuanian Wikipedia....

, near Wilno
Vilnius
Vilnius is the capital of Lithuania, and its largest city, with a population of 560,190 as of 2010. It is the seat of the Vilnius city municipality and of the Vilnius district municipality. It is also the capital of Vilnius County...

, in what was then Russia
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...

n territory but is now part of Lithuania
Lithuania
Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...

. Godowsky's father died when he was a child, and he was raised by his mother and foster-parents, Louis and Minna Passinock, in Vilnius. His talent manifested itself very early, and by age five Godowsky was already composing and becoming proficient on both piano and violin
Violin
The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....

. He gave his first concert at age nine, and toured throughout Lithuania and East Prussia soon afterwards. Although he received a few lessons in his childhood, Godowsky was almost completely self-taught. After briefly studying under Ernst Rudorff
Ernst Rudorff
Ernst Friedrich Karl Rudorff was a German composer and music teacher.Born in Berlin, Rudorff studied piano under Woldemar Bargiel from 1852 to 1857, before enrolling at the Leipzig Conservatory in 1859, where he studied under Ignaz Moscheles, Louis Plaidy, and Julius Rietz. He was also a private...

 at the Königliche Hochschule für Musik in Berlin
Berlin University of the Arts
The Universität der Künste Berlin, UdK is a public art school in Berlin, Germany, one of the four universities in the city...

 he left for the United States, where he made his first concert appearance in Boston in 1884.

In 1885–86 Godowsky continued his American career, first playing at the New York Casino, and then, in 1886, embarking on a large tour of north-eastern USA and Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 with violinist Ovide Musin. In 1887 he returned to Europe and gave numerous recitals in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

 and London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, eventually becoming a protégé and friend of Camille Saint-Saëns
Camille Saint-Saëns
Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns was a French Late-Romantic composer, organist, conductor, and pianist. He is known especially for The Carnival of the Animals, Danse macabre, Samson and Delilah, Piano Concerto No. 2, Cello Concerto No. 1, Havanaise, Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, and his Symphony...

. In 1890 he returned to the United States and began a pedagogical career by joining the staff of the New York College of Music. On 30 April 1891 Godowsky married Frieda Saxe, a childhood friend. In 1891–3 he held a teaching position at the Gilbert Raynolds Combs's Broad Street Conservatory in Philadelphia, and then settled in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

, where he taught at the Chicago Conservatory. By late 1890s Godowsky was extremely well known in North America. Together with Teresa Carreño
Teresa Carreño
María Teresa Carreño García de Sena was a Venezuelan pianist, singer, composer, and conductor.Born into a musical family, she was at first taught by her father, then by Mathias, Louis Moreau Gottschalk and Anton Rubinstein and her talent was recognized at an early age...

 Godowsky has become the first pianist to teach the principle of weight release as distinct from purely muscular momentum; also during the same decade, the first of Godowsky's studies on Chopin études
Studies on Chopin's Etudes
The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's études. The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's études. The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's...

 were composed and published, later to become part of a large series, one of Godowsky's most famous works. In 1897–8 Godowsky further cemented his fame by giving a series of eight concerts surveying the entire 19th century repertoire.

A particularly successful concert at the Beethoven Hall in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

, on 6 December 1900, enhanced Godowsky's reputation greatly. He moved to Berlin, again dividing his time between performing and teaching, and giving a concert tour every year. In 1909 he took over Busoni's master classes at the Vienna Academy of Music, where he continued to teach until 1914. Between 1912 and 1914 Godowsky gave several concerts in the United States, and also made his first gramophone record
Gramophone record
A gramophone record, commonly known as a phonograph record , vinyl record , or colloquially, a record, is an analog sound storage medium consisting of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove...

s there. In 1914 the outbreak of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

 drove him away from Europe and he went back to the United States, where he lived in New York (1914–16), Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...

 (1916–19), and Seattle
Seattle, Washington
Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...

 (1919–22), before returning to New York. Much of the 1920s were spent touring around the world; apart from concert appearances in Europe and United States, Godowsky also gave extensive tours of South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...

 and East Asia
East Asia
East Asia or Eastern Asia is a subregion of Asia that can be defined in either geographical or cultural terms...

. Also during the 1920s he recorded many rolls for the Duo-Art
Duo-Art
Duo-Art was one of the leading reproducing piano technologies of the early 20th century, the others being American Piano Company , introduced in 1913 too, and Welte-Mignon in 1905. These technologies flourished at that time because of the poor quality of the early Phonograph...

 reproducing piano
Player piano
A player piano is a self-playing piano, containing a pneumatic or electro-mechanical mechanism that operates the piano action via pre-programmed music perforated paper, or in rare instances, metallic rolls. The rise of the player piano grew with the rise of the mass-produced piano for the home in...

s, the only reproducing piano mechanism which was available in concert grand Steinways. Godowsky also recorded a large number of piano rolls for the American Piano Company.

However, while Godowsky's career prospered, his personal life slowly started falling apart. His wife Friede fell seriously ill in 1924 and her health continued deteriorating ever since. In 1928 Godowsky's son Gordon abandoned his studies and married a vaudeville dancer, causing his father to disown him. After the Wall Street Crash of 1929
Wall Street Crash of 1929
The Wall Street Crash of 1929 , also known as the Great Crash, and the Stock Market Crash of 1929, was the most devastating stock market crash in the history of the United States, taking into consideration the full extent and duration of its fallout...

 Godowsky's financial situation worsened. A string of recordings the pianist began in London in 1928, as well as public concerts, would have remedied the problem, however, both activities were cut short by an unexpected disaster: during a recording session on 17 June 1930, just after completing Chopin's E major Scherzo, the pianist suffered a severe stroke which left him partially paralysed. Godowsky's remaining years were overshadowed by the event, leaving him deeply depressed. In December 1932 Gordon Godowsky committed suicide, and a year later Godowsky's wife died of a heart attack. The pianist eventually moved to another apartment in New York together with his daughter Dagmar; he continued playing piano for friends and admirers, but never gave public performances. In his last years, Godowsky put much effort into organizing a World Synod of Music and Musicians and an International Council of Music and Musicians, but neither project materialized. After spending much of 1937 and 1938 suffering from various health problems, Godowsky died of stomach cancer on 21 November 1938, at the age of 68.

He was survived by his son Leopold Godowsky, Jr.
Leopold Godowsky, Jr.
Leopold Godowsky, Jr. was an American violinist and chemist, who together with Leopold Mannes created the first practical color transparency film, Kodachrome.-Beginning:...

, the co-inventor (with Leopold Mannes
Leopold Mannes
Leopold Damrosch Mannes was a Jewish-American musician, born in New York City, who, together with Leopold Godowsky, Jr., created the first practical color transparency film, Kodachrome....

) of Kodachrome
Kodachrome
Kodachrome is the trademarked brand name of a type of color reversal film that was manufactured by Eastman Kodak from 1935 to 2009.-Background:...

 photo transparency film, as well as a violinist. Leopold Jr. married George Gershwin
George Gershwin
George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known...

's younger sister, Frances
Frances Gershwin
Frances "Frankie" Gershwin , was am American singer.She was born in Manhattan, New York, the younger sister of George, Ira and Arthur Gershwin. She was the first of the Gershwin family to perform as a child, and she brought home a good sum of money for the time.She married Leopold Godowsky, Jr...

, thus continuing the musical line. His daughter, the actress Dagmar Godowsky
Dagmar Godowsky
Dagmar Godowsky was an American silent film actress born to Polish Jewish parents in Vilna, Lithuania. She was the daughter of the notable pianist and composer Leopold Godowsky.-Silent film actress:...

 (1896–1975), also outlived him. During the 1920s she appeared as a co-lead in various Hollywood silent movies
Silent Movies
Silent Movies are 13 solo guitar compositions by Marc Ribot released September 28, 2010 on Pi Recordings.-Reception:The Allmusic review by Thom Jurek awarded the album 4 stars stating "For those interested in one of the more compelling and quietly provocative and graceful guitar records of 2010,...

, including some with Rudolph Valentino
Rudolph Valentino
Rudolph Valentino was an Italian actor, and early pop icon. A sex symbol of the 1920s, Valentino was known as the "Latin Lover". He starred in several well-known silent films including The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, The Sheik, Blood and Sand, The Eagle and Son of the Sheik...

. She was a popular socialite, and wrote a humorous autobiography First Person Plural (New York, 1958).

Compositions

As a composer, Godowsky has been best known for his paraphrases of piano pieces by other composers, which he enhanced with ingenious contrapuntal devices and rich chromatic harmonies. His most famous work in this genre is the 53 Studies on Chopin's Études
Studies on Chopin's Etudes
The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's études. The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's études. The Studies on Chopin's Études, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's...

(1894–1914), in which he varies the (already challenging) original étude
Étude
An étude , is an instrumental musical composition, most commonly of considerable difficulty, usually designed to provide practice material for perfecting a particular technical skill. The tradition of writing études emerged in the early 19th century with the rapidly growing popularity of the piano...

s using various methods: introducing countermelodies, transferring the technically difficult passages from the right hand to the left, transcribing an entire piece for left hand solo, or even interweaving two études, with the left hand playing one and the right hand the other. The pieces are among the most difficult piano works ever written, and only a few pianists have ventured to perform any of them. Among such pianists are Marc-André Hamelin
Marc-André Hamelin
Marc-André Hamelin, OC, CQ, is a French Canadian virtuoso pianist and composer.Born in Montreal, Quebec, Marc-André Hamelin began his piano studies at the age of five. His father, a pharmacist by trade who was also a pianist, introduced him to the works of Alkan, Godowsky, and Sorabji when he was...

, who recorded the entire set, garnered a number of prestigious awards, and Francesco Libetta
Francesco Libetta
Francesco Libetta is an Italian pianist, composer and conductor.- Biography :Born in Galatone, South Italy, Francesco Libetta studied in Italy , France before basing himself in...

, who performed the complete set in concert (the only pianist to do so from memory) and made a video recording of the set (live in Milan
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...

, March 2006). Other important transcriptions by Godowsky include Renaissance (1906–9), a collection which includes arrangements of music by Rameau and Lully, 12 Schubert Songs (1927), and six transcriptions of Bach's music for solo cello and solo violin, arranged for the same instruments, but with complementary voices, etc.

Although his transcriptions are much more well known, Godowsky also composed a number of substantial original works. He considered the Passacaglia
Passacaglia (Godowsky)
Passacaglia is a solo piano composition by the composer Leopold Godowsky. It was completed in New York, on October 21, 1927. The composition commemorates the one hundredth anniversary of the death of Franz Schubert...

(1928) and a collection of pieces for left hand alone (1930–1) to be his most mature creations; both, however, employ traditional approach to harmony and counterpoint. A more experimental work was the Java Suite (Phonoramas) (1925), composed after a visit to Java, under the influence of gamelan
Gamelan
A gamelan is a musical ensemble from Indonesia, typically from the islands of Bali or Java, featuring a variety of instruments such as metallophones, xylophones, drums and gongs; bamboo flutes, bowed and plucked strings. Vocalists may also be included....

 music. Godowsky was equally comfortable writing large-scale works like the Passacaglia or the five-movement Piano Sonata in E minor (1911) as he was creating collections of smaller pieces, such as the 46 Miniatures for piano four hands and the Triakontameron
Triakontameron
The Triakontameron is a suite of 30 pieces for piano composed in 1920 by Leopold Godowsky; each was written in a single day, and all are written in three-quarter time. The title was inspired by that of Boccaccio's Decameron. Among the best-known excerpts of the suite are Alt Wien, Nocturnal...

(1920; subtitled "30 moods and scenes in triple measure"). Quite a number of Godowsky's original works were considerably difficult to perform; the Passacaglia (which is based on a theme from the first bars of Franz Schubert
Franz Schubert
Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer.Although he died at an early age, Schubert was tremendously prolific. He wrote some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies , liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music...

's "Unfinished" Symphony
Symphony No. 8 (Schubert)
Franz Schubert's Symphony No. 8 in B minor , commonly known as the "Unfinished Symphony" , D.759, was started in 1822 but left with only two movements known to be complete, even though Schubert would live for another six years. A scherzo, nearly completed in piano score but with only two pages...

) was declared to be unplayable even by Vladimir Horowitz
Vladimir Horowitz
Vladimir Samoylovich Horowitz    was a Russian-American classical virtuoso pianist and minor composer. His technique and use of tone color and the excitement of his playing were legendary. He is widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century.-Life and early...

, who claimed it would require six hands to perform. Despite their traditionalism, Godowsky's compositions may have influenced Maurice Ravel
Maurice Ravel
Joseph-Maurice Ravel was a French composer known especially for his melodies, orchestral and instrumental textures and effects...

 and Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Prokofiev
Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor who mastered numerous musical genres and is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century...

.

Reception and influence

Godowsky was one of the most highly regarded pianists of his time, praised by listeners, colleagues, and critics alike. Arthur Rubinstein
Arthur Rubinstein
Arthur Rubinstein KBE was a Polish-American pianist. He received international acclaim for his performances of the music of a variety of composers...

 remarked that it would take him "five hundred years to get a mechanism like [Godowsky's]", while Ferruccio Busoni
Ferruccio Busoni
Ferruccio Busoni was an Italian composer, pianist, editor, writer, piano and composition teacher, and conductor.-Biography:...

 considered himself and Godowsky to be the only composers to have made substantial contributions to keyboard writing and performance since Liszt. Godowsky's phenomenally difficult transcriptions and impeccable technique prompted some critics to describe him as "a pianist for pianists", as James Huneker
James Huneker
James Gibbons Huneker was an American music writer and critic.Huneker was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He studied piano in Europe under Leopold Doutreleau and audited the Paris piano class of Frédéric Chopin's pupil Georges Mathias. He came to New York City in 1885 and remained there...

 has done. Among Godowsky's admirers were such distinguished pianists as Vladimir de Pachmann
Vladimir de Pachmann
Vladimir von Pachmann or Pachman was a pianist of Russian-German ethnicity, especially noted for performing the works of Chopin, and also for his eccentric on-stage style.-Biography:...

 and Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Rachmaninoff
Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, one of the last great representatives of Romanticism in Russian classical music...

, who, according to Godowsky's daughter Dagmar, idolized her father's music and performances. Even those who disliked Godowsky's interpretations usually acknowledged his tremendous technical gifts: Claudio Arrau
Claudio Arrau
Claudio Arrau León was a Chilean pianist known for his interpretations of a vast repertoire spanning from the baroque to 20th-century composers, especially Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, Brahms and Debussy...

, for example, declared Godowsky "one of the greatest technicians", even though he considered his playing "boring" and complained that Godowsky "never played above mezzo-forte."

Godowsky's vast repertoire spanned more than two centuries of music, from contemporary music to that of Rameau
Jean-Philippe Rameau
Jean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer for the harpsichord of his time, alongside François...

 and Lully
Jean-Baptiste Lully
Jean-Baptiste de Lully was an Italian-born French composer who spent most of his life working in the court of Louis XIV of France. He is considered the chief master of the French Baroque style. Lully disavowed any Italian influence in French music of the period. He became a French subject in...

, whose music he transcribed. Although he regularly played public concerts until 1930, Godowsky was plagued by stage fright
Stage fright
Stage fright or performance anxiety is the anxiety, fear, or persistent phobia which may be aroused in an individual by the requirement to perform in front of an audience, whether actually or potentially . In the context of public speaking, this fear is termed glossophobia, one of the most common...

, and particularly disliked the recording studio, like many performers of his time. On one occasion, he described the recording process thus:
The fear of doing a trifling wrong augmented while playing; the better one succeeded in playing the foregoing, the greater the fear became while playing. It was a dreadful ordeal, increasingly so the more sensitive the artist, I broke down in my health in London in the Spring of 1930, owing to these nerve-killing tortures. How can one think of emotion!

Consequently, it was acknowledged that Godowsky's best work was not in public or in the recording studio, but at home. After leaving Godowsky's home one night, Josef Hofmann told Abram Chasins
Abram Chasins
Abram Chasins was an American composer, pianist, piano teacher, lecturer, musicologist, music broadcaster, radio executive and author....

: "Never forget what you heard tonight; never lose the memory of that sound. There is nothing like it in the world. It is tragic that the world has never heard Popsy as only he can play."

Godowsky's pupils included Paul Wells
Paul Wells (musician)
Paul Wells was an American pianist, composer, music educator, and writer on music. Born in Carthage, Missouri, he was educated at the Peabody Institute at Johns Hopkins University. After solo appearances with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra and the Minnesota Orchestra, he pursued further studies...

, Jan Smeterlin
Jan Smeterlin
Jan Smeterlin was a Polish concert pianist. He is especially known as an interpreter of Chopin and Karol Szymanowski.-Life:...

, Issay Dobrowen
Issay Dobrowen
Issay Alexandrovich Dobrowen was a Russian-Norwegian pianist, composer and conductor.He was born Itschok Zorachovitch Barabeitchik in Nizhny Novgorod, Russian Empire of Jewish parents. He left the Soviet Union in 1922, and became a Norwegian citizen in 1929.He once played Beethoven's Sonata...

 and most importantly, Heinrich Neuhaus
Heinrich Neuhaus
Heinrich Gustavovich Neuhaus was a Soviet pianist and pedagogue of German extraction. He taught at the Moscow Conservatory from 1922 to 1964. He was made a People's Artist of the RSFSR in 1956...

, who taught Sviatoslav Richter
Sviatoslav Richter
Sviatoslav Teofilovich Richter was a Soviet pianist well known for the depth of his interpretations, virtuoso technique, and vast repertoire. He is widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century.-Childhood:...

, Emil Gilels
Emil Gilels
Emil Grigoryevich Gilels was a Soviet pianist, widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the 20th century.His last name is sometimes transliterated Hilels.-Biography:...

, and Radu Lupu
Radu Lupu
Radu Lupu is a Romanian concert pianist. He has won a number of the most prestigious awards in classical piano, including first prizes in the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition and the Leeds International Pianoforte Competition....

, among others.

External links


Recordings

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