Performers

Zdzisław Górzyński

He studied music theory with Władysław Żeleński and piano with Wiktor Barabasz at Krakow Conservatory, later conducting with Franz Schalk in Vienna. He made his concert debut in Krakow’s Stary Theatre (1915). Between the world wars, he worked as a theatre conductor in Krakow (Nowości, Popularny, Słowacki theatres), Warsaw (Warsaw Philharmonic, Nowości, Teatr Wielki, and others), L’viv (the Opera and the Operetta), Katowice (Teatr Polski). In 1935–1939 he conducted the Little Orchestra of Polish Radio. In 1926 he presented Moniuszko’s Halka in Vienna’s Volksoper. During the war, he lived first in L’viv, later in Warsaw under an assumed name, teaching music lessons and giving clandestine concerts.

After World War II, he was a conductor at Łódź Philharmonic (1945–1948), the director of Poznań Opera (1948/1949 and 1954–1963). He also worked at Warsaw’s Opera and Philharmonic (1949–1954), and later at Teatr Wielki (1961–1970). He conducted contemporary stage works and many Polish operas (including all of Moniuszko’s operatic output). He gave performances in the Czech Republic, Bulgaria, East Germany, the Netherlands, and Hungary. He collaborated with Dresden’s and Berlin’s State Opera houses; led spectacles of Halka in Görlitz and Leipzig; guest-conducted the orchestras of the ORTF in Paris, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Prague Phiharmonic, Staatskapelle Dresden, the Leipzig Gewandhaus, Berlin’s RIAS and Symphonisches Orchester, and Tonhalle Zurich. His accolades include the Cavalier’s (1952) and Commander’s (1955) Crosses of the Order of Polonia Restituta.
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