Authors

A composer of the young Poland movement, born on 18th September 1883 in Warsaw; he died on 1st January 1953 in Katowice. He received his first music lessons from his father, who was a pianist and a professor at Warsaw Conservatory. Having studied piano with Aleksander Michałowski and composition with Zygmunt Noskowski in Warsaw, Różycki made a successful debut as a composer with the symphonic scherzo Stańczyk (1903), which opened the way to studies with Engelbert Humperdinck at Berlin’s Königliche Akademie der Künste. It was in Berlin that he founded (together with Karol Szymanowski, Apolinary Szeluto, and Grzegorz Fitelberg) the Young Polish Composers’ Publishing Company (1905). Having returned to Warsaw after seven years spent abroad, Różycki took up the post of Warsaw Opera’s artistic director. He also engaged in journalist work, co-founded the Contemporary Composers’ Section of the Warsaw Music Society and presided over the Polish Composers’ Association into which that section later transformed. Most of all, however, he was preoccupied with composing music (including his ‘fantasy ballet’ Sir Twardowski, 1920). The majority of his manuscripts were destroyed by fire during the Warsaw Uprising. Różycki spent the last years of his life in Katowice, where he held the post of professor at the State Higher School of Music. He composed little new music in that period (Warsaw Liberated, 1950), mostly working on reconstructions of his lost scores. Różycki is considered as a master of the symphonic poem (Anhelli, 1909, and others), captivating the audience with melodic invention, spectacular and colourful orchestrations, as well as apt musical characterisations. An equally important place in his output is occupied by ballets (e.g. Apollo and the Girl, 1937) and operas (major titles include Boleslaus the Bold, 1908, Eros and Psyche, 1916), which were initially influenced by Richard Wagner’s music (Medusa, 1908–1911), and later – by the verismo style (Beatrix Cenci, 1926). His numerous accolades include, most prominently, the 1st prize in Warsaw Philharmonic’s 10th Anniversary Composers’ Competition for Kong Cophetua (1910) and the Commander’s Cross with Star of the Order of Polonia Restituta (1951).