Woytowicz, Boleslaw

views updated

Woytowicz, Boleslaw

Woytowicz, Boleslaw, Polish pianist, pedagogue, and composer; b. Dunajowce, Dec. 5, 1899; d. Katowice, July 11,1980. He began musical training with his grandfather, the organist and composer Mikolaj Woytowicz. After piano lessons with Nowacki and Hanicki (1913-15) and Wielhorski (1916-17), he took his Ph.D. in philology at the Univ. of Kiev and studied mathematics and law at the Univ. of Warsaw. He pursued further piano instruction with Michalowski at the Chopin Music Coll. in Warsaw (1920-24) and received composition training with Wielhorski, Szopski, and Maliszewski, and later with Boulanger in Paris (1929-32). In 1924 he launched his career as a pianist. He also was a prof. of piano and theory at the Chopin Music Coll. (1924-39), a teacher of piano and composition at the Katowice Cons, (from 1945), and a prof. of composition at the Krakow Cons, (from 1963). In 1937 he received the Polish State Prize for music.

Works

dramatic: Ballet: Powrót (1937). O R C H. : Piano Concerto (1932); Zalobny poema (Funeral Poem; 1935); 3 syms.: No. 1 (1938), No. 2 (1945; Krakow, Sept. 27,1946), and No. 3, Concertante, for Piano and Orch. (1963); Symphonic Sketches (1949). CHAMBER: 2 string quartets (1932, 1953); Flute Sonata (1952). P i a n o : 12 Études (1948); 10 Études (1960); Little Piano Sonata (1974). VOCAL: Kolysanka (Cradle Song) for Soprano, Flute, Clarinet, Bassoon, and Harp (1931); Kantata na pochwale pracy (Cantata in Praise of Labor; 1948); Prorok (The Prophet), cantata (1950); Lamento for Soprano, Piano, and Clarinet (I960).