Music HERstory: Maria Aghate Szymanowska (1789 - 1831)

Maria Aghate Szymanowska (1789 - 1831)

Polymnia

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Biography

Maria Aghate Szymanowska (at birth Wolowska) was a Polish pianist, composer and also one of the first professional virtuoso pianists of the 19th century. She was born in Warsaw, Poland on December 14, 1789 into a prosperous middle-class family. Her father Franciszek Wołowski was a landlord and a brewer. Her mother Barbara Wołowska (née Lanckorońska) came from a noble Polish family, the Lanckoroński. The history of her early years and especially her musical studies are not completely confirmed but it is known that she displayed a precocious musical talent and studied piano with Antoni Lisowski (1798-1800) and Tmazs Gremm (1800-04). She also studied composition with Franciszek Lessel, Józef Elsner, Karol Kurpiński and also had as mentors the composer John Field (whom she met in Moscow) and Luigi Cheribini (whom she met in Paris).

Maria gave her first public recitals in 1810. First in Warsaw, at the residence of Prince Radziwill, then in Dresden, Vienna, London, St Petersburg and Berlin. At first these were just private concerts, but little by little she made a name for herself and gained new contacts, decisive for the development of her career. In that same year she married Józef Szymanowski, a wealthy land-owner, with whom she had three children while living in Poland: Helena (1811–61) and twins Celina (1812–55) and Romuald (1812–40).

Apart from being a virtuoso concert pianist, she was also recognized as a composer: three of her five melodies commissioned by Julian Niemcewicz (poet and professor) appear in the 1816 edition of Historic Polish songs, set to verses written by him. This collection, created to revive the memory of the ancient forming people of Poland, would be republished many times in the course of the 19th century. In 1820, Breitkopf &; Härtel began to publish the works of Szymanowska: her Twenty Exercises and Preludes for pianoforte, which Schumann liked, as well as her Six Romances for voice and piano, to texts by Shakespeare, Pushkin (the father of Alexander) and Cardinal De Bernis. This was also the year of her marriage dissolution once the couple grew strong incompatible interests. Szymanowski's reluctance in allowing Maria to pursue a professional musical career was a factor for their divorce. The children remained with her and Józef Szymanowski would die in 1832.

Her piano performances continued in a more or less uninterrupted succession of successful concert tours: England in 1818, Russia and Western Europe from 1822 to 1827, including both public and private performances in Germany, France, England (on multiple occasions), Italy, Belgium and Holland. In Russia, in 1823, she played in Vilnius, Saint-Petersburg (where she made the acquaintance of Hummel and Field), Moscow, Riga, Kiev (where she played with Lipinski, “the Polish Paganini”) and Lvov. A number of these performances were given in private to the royalty and supported her recognition as a great pianist. In that same year the Tsar Alexander officially appointed Szymanowska to the coveted position of First Pianist to the Empresses Maria Fedorovna and Elizaveta Alekseevna, at the Russian court, which provided financial security and enhanced her reputation. In 1824 she played at the Paris Conservatory with Baillot, the excellent violinist. Hanry, the publisher, had her nocturne The murmur printed, which quickly became a fashionable piece. In England alone, also during 1824, her performance schedule included concerts at the Royal Philharmonic Society (May 18), Hanover Square (with members of the royal family present in June 11), and other performances for several English dukes. From England (public concerts and private lessons) she went to Geneva and Italy, with letters of recommendation from Rossini. In March 1825, she returned to Paris to play at the Louvre and afterwards was acclaimed once again in Amsterdam and London. She finally regained Warsaw in 1927, where she triumphed at the National Theatre on the 15th January and 7th February. In the audience was present a particularly attentive young man: Chopin.

Her playing was very well received by critics and audiences alike, earning her a reputation for having a delicate tone, lyrical sense of virtuosity and operatic freedom. She was one of the first professional piano virtuosos in 19th-century Europe and one of the first pianists to perform memorized repertoire in public, a decade ahead of Franz Liszt and Clara Wieck-Schumann. She toured until 1828 in Germany, France, Italy, England, Poland, Austria, Belgium, Holland and Russia, commanding high ticket prices and playing to large audiences.

After years of touring, she returned to Warsaw for some time before relocating in early 1828, first to Moscow and then to St. Petersburg. There she divided her time between the education of her daughters, composition (Ballades by Mickiewicz, Nocturne in B flat), lessons and concerts. Her salon was frequented by the capital’s cosmopolitan elite. At the height of her glory, she was abruptly carried off by the cholera epidemic which hit St Petersburg in the summer of 1831.

Compositions

Maria Szymanowska composed more than a hundred pieces, many of them short, virtuoso piano works, based on folk melodies and dances and imbued with the ideals of revolutionary patriotism. Like many women composers of her time, she wrote music predominantly for instrumentation which she had access to, including many solo piano pieces, polonaises, songs and some chamber works.

Her work is typically labelled, stylistically, as part of the pre-romantic period and of the Polish Sentimentalism. Her sustenuto cantabile style of playing, based on her desire to emulate the famous singers of the day, was considered an innovation on the pianoforte. Critics differed, as some noted brilliant technique, others criticized her use of rubato, and yet others applauded her musical understanding. All of them were agreed on recognizing her intellect. Most of her works were published in Leipzig by Breitkopf & Härtel during the 19th century, some of them after her death.

Szymanowska scholar Sławomir Dobrzański describes her playing and its historical significance as follows: "Her Études and Préludes show innovative keyboard writing. The Nocturne in B flat is her most mature piano composition. Szymanowska's mazurkas represent one of the first attempts at stylization of the dance. Fantasy and Caprice contain an impressive vocabulary of pianistic technique. Her polonaises follow the tradition of polonaise-writing created by Michal Kleofas Ogiński. Szymanowska's musical style is parallel to the compositional starting point of Frédéric Chopin and many of her compositions had an obvious impact on Chopin's mature musical language”. While scholars have debated the reach of her influence on her compatriot Chopin, her career as a pianist and composer strikingly foreshadows his own, as well as the broader trend in 19th-century Europe of the virtuoso pianist/composer, whose abilities as a performer expanded her technical possibilities as a composer.

Because of her stature as a performance artist Szymanowska developed a strong web of connections with some of the most notable composers, performing musicians and poets of her day. Her salon in St. Petersburg became the centre of cultural life, patriotic conspiracy and a place where Polish émigrés could find assistance. Her musical autograph albums are filled with short pieces of music by those who visited her salon, including Robert and Clara Schumann, Chopin, Liszt, Beethoven, Field, Rossini, Meyerbeer and Franz Xaver Mozart (son of W.A.Mozart).

Johann Nepomuk Hummel and Field dedicated piano pieces to her. Goethe is said to have fallen madly in love with her (she was the inspiration for his poem Aussöhnung). According to Goethe's expression, quoted by Romain Rolland, Maria Szymanowska was a "ravishing Almighty of the sound world”. Cherubini dedicated his Fantasia in C major to her. Robert Schumann described her études as “written by the ‘feminine Field’,… in character and invention… presenting the most remarkable qualities, for a woman composer, that we have met with”. Other critics described her as a musician who defined Romanticism in her compositions and in her playing.

Works for Solo Keyboard

Caprice sur la Romance de Joconde (et l’on revient toujours) pour le pianoforte (1819)
Cotillon ou Valse Figurée pour le piano (1824)
Danse polonaise: pour le piano dédié à Monsieur Baillot (c.1825)
18 Danses de différent genre pour le pianoforte (1819)
Douze exercices: pour le piano (c.1825)
Fantaisie in F major pour le Pianoforte (c.1820)
Grande Valse pour le pianoforte à quatre mains (c.1820)
Le Murmure Nocturne pour le piano composé et arrangé à trios mains in A flat (1825)
Nocturne in B flat (1852)
Polonaise pour le pianoforte sur l’air national favori du feu Pr. Joseph Poniatowsky (1820)
Polonaise in C major (1825)
Romance de Monsieur le Prince Alexander Galitzin arrangée pour le Pianoforte (c.1820)
4 Préludes (c. 1820)
6 Marches pour le pianoforte (c.1819)
6 Menuets Pour le pianoforte (1819)
24 Mazurkas, or National Polish Dances (1826)
Valses à trois mains pour le piano forte (c.1820)
20 Exercices et Préludes pour le pianoforte (1819)

Works for Voice and Piano Accompaniment

Complainte d’un aveugle qui demandait l’aumône au Jardin des plantes à Paris (c.182?)
Jadwiga, królowa polska (1816)
Jan Albrycht (1816)
Duma o kniaziu Michale Glińskim (1816).
Le chant de la Vilia (1829)
Le Départ. Romance (paroles de Cervantes) mise en Musique (1819).
Pieśń z Wieży (1828)
Romance à Josephine [n.d.]
6 Romances avec accompaniment de pianoforte (c.1820)
Śpiewka na dwa głosy. “Ah! jakiż to piękny kwiatek” (1829)
Śpiewka na powrót Woysk Polskich. “Nie będę łez ronić” Mazurka (1822)
Świtezianka (c.1828)
Trzy śpiewy z poematu Adama Mickiewicza Wallenrod (1828).
Wilija naszych strumieni rodzica (c.1830)

Chamber Works

Divertissement pour le pianoforte avec accompagnement de violon (1820)
Sérénade pour le Pianoforte avec accompagnement de Violoncelle (1820)
Thème varié (1821)

More information:

"Maria Szymanowska Society’s web portal” maintained by the society with the funding support provided by its private and institutional partners since 2011: http://www.maria-szymanowska.eu/index-en

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Source: Polymnia