Background

Wanda Aleksandra Landowska was born in Warsaw, Poland, the daughter of Marian Landowski, a lawyer, and Ewa Lautenberg, a linguist. The Landowskis were of Jewish ancestry but had converted to Roman Catholicism. Landowska showed pronounced musical gifts at an early age and gave her first public recital, at the piano, at the age of four.

Education

Wanda Aleksandra Landowska studied under Jan Kleczynski and with the renowned Chopin interpreter Aleksander Michalowski at the Warsaw Conservatory, from which she graduated in 1896. Although her studies included the nineteenth-century repertoire, her inclination was toward the music of Bach, Mozart, Haydn, and Rameau. Astonished at hearing her play Bach so well, the conductor Arthur Nikish nicknamed her "Bacchante. " In 1896 she went to Berlin to study composition with Heinrich Urban. In 1900 she went to Paris where she had lessons with Moritz Moszkowski.

Career

Consumed by her love for early keyboard music, Landowska decided to devote herself to its authentic performance and to reviving the harpsichord, a precursor of the piano that had fallen into disuse. Assisted by her husband, she visited libraries and museums, studying documents and musical instruments. She also met the founders of the Schola Cantorum, Vincent d'Indy, Charles Bordes, and Alexandre Guilmant, as well as musicologists involved in the revival of early music. Performing at first on a small, inadequate reconstruction of a small Pleyel harpsichord, she introduced such music as part of her first piano recital in Paris in 1903.

She subsequently commissioned the piano firm of Pleyel to build a harpsichord suitable for playing not only early sixteenth-century music, but also all keyboard music written before the nineteenth century, especially the works of Bach. The plan was devised after Landowska and the chief engineer of Pleyel had carefully studied keyboard instruments preserved in European museums. The first two-manual, concert-size Pleyel harpsichord was completed in 1912. It had four sets of strings (two eight-foot, one four-foot, and one sixteen-foot register) as well as a coupler, a lute stop, and a second row of jacks for the upper keyboard. Landowska introduced it at a Bach festival in Breslau later that year.

While the instrument was being built, Landowska devoted much effort to promoting the results of her research on the interpretation of early keyboard music, the performing tradition of which had been distorted or obliterated by romantic pianism. She wrote about the historical fluctuations of styles, the realization of ornaments, the rhythmic particularities of baroque music, the special technique required to play the plucked-string harpsichord, and the manner of applying registration.

In 1905 she published "Sur l'interprétation des oeuvres de clavecin de J. S. Bach. " Other articles followed and, in 1909, she wrote La musique ancienne, in collaboration with her husband. In 1913 a harpsichord class was created for Landowska at the Hochschule für Musik in Berlin.

When World War I began, she and her husband were detained in Germany. Later Landowska went to Switzerland, where she participated in a performance of Bach's St. Matthew's Passion, accompanying recitatives and arias at the harpsichord; it was the first time the harpsichord was used in performances of the Passion since Bach's death. She also gave master classes in Basel and Barcelona before returning to Paris. She then resumed her concert tours and taught privately and at the Ecole Normale de Musique.

In 1923, at the invitation of Leopold Stokowski, Landowska came to the United States for the first of several seasons of concert tours, bringing with her four large Pleyel harpsichords. That year she made her first recordings for the Victor Company. In 1925 Landowska bought a house in St. -Leu-la-Forêt, twelve miles north of Paris, and had a small concert hall built. There she founded the École de Musique Ancienne and in July 1927 inaugurated a series of summer concerts, as soloist and with her students. The performances were attended by musicians, artists, and writers in ever-increasing numbers.

In May 1933 she gave this century's first integral performance of Bach's Goldberg Variations on the harpsichord. Other programs were devoted to the music of Couperin, Rameau, Handel, Scarlatti, Mozart, Haydn, and other baroque composers. Inspired by Landowska's revival of the harpsichord, composers began writing for it. In 1923 Manuel de Falla introduced it in his Retablo and soon after composed a concerto for harpsichord and five instruments (1926), dedicated to Landowska. Francis Poulenc attended the premiere and in 1929 dedicated his Concert ChampÉtre for harpsichord and orchestra to her.

Landowska collected an important library that included manuscripts and rare first editions as well as a number of early instruments. But with the German invasion of France in June 1940 she had to abandon her home and school, which were ransacked by the Nazis. She took refuge in Banyuls-sur-Mer. In October 1941 she gave a few concerts in Switzerland, and the following month she sailed for the United States, bringing with her a Pleyel harpsichord secured through a loan from a former student.

On February 21, 1942, Landowska performed the Goldberg Variations in New York City's Town Hall to a tremendous ovation and unprecedented rave reviews. After settling in New York City, she resumed her teaching, recorded for RCA Victor, and concertized. In 1947 she moved to Lakeville, Connecticut, a country setting that she loved, and at the age of seventy-five completed there the recording of Bach's entire Well-Tempered Clavier. Despite her dedication to the harpsichord, Landowska never ceased playing the piano, giving special attention to the manner of transferring to the modern instrument the tonal qualities of the fortepiano of Mozart and Haydn's time. The manuscripts of most of her own compositions have been lost, but her cadenzas for several Mozart, Haydn, and Handel concertos have been published.

In 1953 NBC television taped an interview with her as part of its "Wisdom" series. She died in Lakeville, Connecticut. Her house, preserved as the Landowska Center, contains her instruments, library, papers, and memorabilia and is also a school at which her teachings are perpetuated. Only five feet tall, Landowska was a regal stage presence. Her abundant black hair, deep brown eyes, and Hebraic profile were striking. Her artistic convictions, forcefully expressed, have stirred many controversies; yet no one can deny her seminal role in the revival of the harpsichord and its literature, or challenge the technical mastery, authority, and beauty of her interpretations.

Achievements

• Wanda Landowska has been listed as a notable musician by Marquis Who's Who.
  
  Landowska inspired several composers to write for the harpsichord. In 1926 she commissioned Manuel de Falla to compose a concerto, and Francis Poulenc dedicated to her his Concert champêtre, which she premiered in Paris.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Musique ancienne: le mépris pour les anciens--la force de la sonorité--le style--l'interprétation--les virtuoses--les Mécènes et la Musique (French Edition)

    (This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)

  • mozart: piano concerto no. 26 / haydn: harpsichord concerto LP

    (vinyl record)

  • Cadenzas and Ornamentations for the Piano Concerto No. 22, in E-flat major, K. 482, by W. A. Mozart. First and third movements
  • WANDA LANDOWSKA MEMORIAL EDITION
  • Concerto pour clavecin (ou piano) flute, hautbois, clarinette, violon et violoncello. a Wanda Landowska. (Partition de poche, format in-26)
  • Landowska on music
  • Cadenzas for the Piano Concerto No. 20, in D minor, K. 466, by W. A. Mozart. First and third movements
  • By Wanda Landowska - Musique Ancienne: Le Ma¸pris Pour Les Anciens--La Force De La Son (2014-03-15) Paperback
  • Wanda Landowska et la renaissance de la musique ancienne (1CD audio)
  • LANDOWSKA: TREASURY OF HARPSICHORD MUSIC - vinyl lp. J.S. BACH, PRELUDE, FUGUE AND ALLEGRO IN E-FLAT - J.S. BACH, FANTASIA IN C MINOR - DOMENICO SCARLATTI, SONATA IN D (LONGO 418) - SONATA IN D MINOR (LONGO 432) OTHERS.

Personality

Wanda Aleksandra Landowska had a warm, generous, and witty personality and a genuine simplicity.

Connections

Wanda Aleksandra Landowska was married to the Polish folklorist Henry Lew. In April 1919, Lew was killed in a car accident.

Father:

Marian Landowski

Mother:

Ewa Lautenberg

Linguist

Late Husband:

Henry Lew

References

• Wanda Landowska (Great concert artists)
• Virtuoso: The Life and Art of Niccolo Paganini, Franz Liszt, Anton Rubinstein, Ignace Jan Paderewski, Fritz Kreisler, Pablo Casals, Wanda Landowska, Vladimir Horowitz, Glenn Gould
• Wanda Landowska - Manuel de Falla : Correspondance (1922-1931): Mémé et le moine, une amitié précieuse (French Edition)