# Aleksander Michałowski

Aleksander Michałowski (17 May [O.S. 5 May] 1851 – 17 October 1938) was a Polish pianist, pedagogue, and composer, described by Marian Filar as "one of the all-time great Polish pianists". He influenced the teaching of pianoforte technique, especially in relation to the works of Chopin and J.S. Bach. He transmitted this performance practice legacy to a large number of pupils.

## Early life and training

Aleksander Michałowski was born in the year 1851 in Kamianets-Podilskyi in Ukraine, which was then part of the Russian Empire. From 1867, at the age of 16, he studied at the Leipzig Conservatory as a pupil of Ignaz Moscheles, Carl Reinecke and Theodor Coccius; Coccius was his greatest influence. In 1869, he traveled to Berlin and studied under Carl Tausig; however, Tausig attempted to make him adopt a very high finger position, which nearly ruined his technique. In 1870, he moved to Warsaw, where he settled permanently.
Around this time, Michałowski befriended and studied with Karol Mikuli (1821–1897), who had received lessons from Chopin between 1844 and 1848, and was head of the Lviv Conservatory. Mikuli imparted to him many of Chopin's ideas about the performance of his works, passing on a performing tradition. Michałowski also met Chopin's gifted pupil Princess Marcelina Czartoryska (née Radziwiłł), who played some mazurkas for him. As his teacher Moscheles had also been a friend of Chopin's, Michałowski obtained a rich understanding of Chopin's pianistic thought and performance through three living connections to the composer-performer.

## Artistic style

He was quite familiar with all Chopin's works and devoted a lifetime to their study. In performance, he occasionally altered the musical text, and transcribed some in the manner of Moriz Rosenthal. In 1878, he visited Franz Liszt at Weimar, and at first (having connections with the Leipzig Conservatory) was not welcomed, but afterwards made such an impression that Liszt acknowledged his authenticity of performance and approved the variants he introduced.
A later successor of Michałowski's at the Warsaw, Zbigniew Drzewiecki, wrote:
   As an interpreter of Chopin, he created a certain style of rendering the composer's works which found many imitators. It consisted of the chiselling of swift passages and stressing their elegance in smoothing the edges of sharper expressive climaxes, in lending Chopin's works the air of almost drawing-room sentimentality. And yet this slight sentimentality was always under the strict control of moderation, instrumental purity, and good taste.

## Teaching principles

In 1874, Michałowski settled in Warsaw and took up teaching, though initially privately. In 1891 he became professor of the concert pianists' class at the Warsaw Institute of Music, at that time under the direction of Apolinary Katski, continuing there until 1918, after which he taught at the Fryderyk Chopin Music School of the Warsaw Music Society. He particularly emphasized the importance of contrapuntal playing, and during the first two years of his students' work with him he made them study the contrapuntal keyboard music of J.S. Bach.
In the case of one of his most famous students, Wanda Landowska, this emphasis on Bach's music turned into a career dedicated to Bach and to baroque music. Chopin himself had had sympathy for Bach, and Michałowski understood that the contrapuntal principles were very important in understanding of Chopin's work. He also encouraged developing the imaginative and bravura aspects of his students playing. He often demonstrated technique and style in his lessons, further encouraging students to imitate aspects of his own performance.

## Students and successors

Among his very many students there were several who might have had more famous international careers had it not been for interruption by the two World Wars – which in some cases terminated – their work. Among them was Jerzy Żurawlew, who founded the International Chopin Piano Competitions in 1927. Wanda Landowska, Vladimir Sofronitsky, and Mischa Levitzki were probably the most famous pupils; Landowska was not only forced to flee the Nazis, but also had her musical collection confiscated. Róża Etkin-Moszkowska was killed in the German retreat from Warsaw in 1944.
Henryk Pachulski (b. 1859) and Piotr Maszyński (b. 1855) were among his earlier pupils, and Stanislaw Urstein, Edwarda Chojnacka, Wiktor Chapowicki, Józef Śmidowicz, Vladimir Sofronitsky, Jadwiga Sarnecka, and Bolesław Woytowicz among the later ones. Heinrich Neuhaus, a renowned teacher, whose own pupils included Sviatoslav Richter, Emil Gilels, Yakov Zak, and Ryszard Bakst, received lessons from Michałowski. Radziwonowicz also lists Stefania Allina, Zofia Buckiewiczowa, Janina Familier Hepner, Zofia Frankiewicz, Stefania Niekrasz, Stanislaw Nawrocki, Ludomir Różycki, Piotr Rytel, Henryk Schulz-Evler, Władysław Szpilman, Juliusz Wolfsohn, and Alexander Zakin as Michałowski pupils.
Bolesław Kon, an outstanding pupil, who also studied with Konstantin Igumnov, died in 1936 aged 30. Jerzy Lefeld became Michałowski's amanuensis.
Józef Turczyński, his immediate successor at Warsaw, and after him, Zbigniew Drzewiecki, were not his personal students, but continued the tradition of his work as leading teachers of the Polish school.

## Later career

Michałowski was also a chamber musician, performing duos with the violinist Stanisław Barcewicz and trios with Barcewicz and the cellist Aleksandr Verzhbilovich.
He wrote 35 pianoforte works (mostly short pieces) and produced an instructive edition on the works of Chopin. He made a substantial number of gramophone records, made in three different periods, the first around 1906, the second around 1918, and the last in the 1930s. Harold C. Schonberg considered that they revealed a 'heroic voice.' Although he had been a very successful concert performer, he increasingly turned to teaching, particularly when his sight failed rapidly after 1912. However, he was persuaded back to the platform by a colleague, Mme Ruszczycówna, and gave a huge number of concerts in the following years, in 1919 celebrating a half-century since his debut. In 1929, he performed both Chopin concerti in a single concert.
He died in Warsaw, aged 87, on 17 October 1938, the anniversary of Chopin's death.

## Discography

* 2016: Acte Préalable AP0365 – Aleksander Michałowski - Piano Works 1 (Artur Cimirro)