Teodor Leszetycki
Encyclopedia
Theodor Leschetizky was a Polish
pianist
, professor
and composer
.
. At age eleven he performed a Czerny piano concerto in Lemberg (near Łańcut), with Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart
(the son of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
) conducting. At the age of fourteen, he started to tutor his first pupils. By the age of eighteen he was a well-known virtuoso in Vienna and beyond. His composition teacher was Simon Sechter
, subsequently the teacher of Anton Bruckner
.
At the invitation of his friend Anton Rubinstein
he went to St. Petersburg to teach in the court of the Grand Duchess Helen. Remaining there from 1852 to 1877, he was one of the founders of the St. Petersburg Conservatory of Music in 1862. While in Russia he married one of his most famous pupils, Anna Yesipova
(the second of his four wives), and had two children (one of them Robert Leschetizky).
In 1878 he returned to Vienna and began teaching there, creating one of the most eminent private piano studios in history, besides Franz Liszt
in Weimar
. He taught thousands of students, in the Weimarerstraße (formerly the Carl Ludwigstraße) XIX. Bezirk Wien
, Vienna
. They came from all over the world, many from the United States. Leschetizky taught until the age of 85, leaving for Dresden in 1915, where he died that year.
after his death. His descendants still live in Bad Ischl and there is a Leschetizky Villa at the Leschetizky Straβe, the summer resort, where Theodor Leschetizky often vacationed with his friend Johannes Brahms
.
Leschetizky had a granddaughter, Ilse Leschetizky (1910–1997), who was a distinguished pianist and teacher. One of her daughters, Margret Tautschnig, continues the Leschetizky tradition with the Leschetizky Verein Ősterreich in Bad Ischl. This organisation was co-founded by the Belgian pianist Peter Ritzen
.
, Annette Hullah, Marie Prentner, and Malwine Brée, author of The Leschetizky Method (a title which he approved, while stating that there "was no method!"). The list of virtuoso concert artists he trained includes Anna Yesipova
, Ignaz Friedman
, Ignacy Jan Paderewski
, Artur Schnabel
, Mark Hambourg
, Alexander Brailowsky
, Benno Moiseiwitsch
, and Mieczysław Horszowski.
Perhaps the secret of his successful teaching was that he worked with each student's personality and technical abilities in an individual way. His famous weekly classes provided his students the opportunity to try out their pieces prior to public performances before a discerning audience of their fellow students and invited guests.
A humorous probable allusion to Leschetizky occurs in the "Stella in Oxford" Chapter (Book Three, Chapter 10) of Compton Mackenzie
's 1913-1914 novel Sinister Street
, where there is mentioned a notable teacher of the piano in Vienna "with a perfectly impossible name beginning with L".
Until his death, Leschetizky espoused a philosophy of music-making and enjoying life to the fullest, captured in one of his most famous sayings (translated from the German):
Although his piano pieces are primarily smaller works in the genre of salon music, they display an expressive lyric gift while exploiting the piano's capabilities to great effect. Most of Leschetizky's music has been out of print since the early twentieth century, with the exception of the Andante Finale, Op. 13 (a paraphrase for piano left hand on the famous sextet from the opera Lucia di Lammermoor
by Donizetti
); and Les deux alouettes, Op. 2, No. 1.
Poles
thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...
pianist
Pianist
A pianist is a musician who plays the piano. A professional pianist can perform solo pieces, play with an ensemble or orchestra, or accompany one or more singers, solo instrumentalists, or other performers.-Choice of genres:...
, professor
Professor
A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...
and composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
.
Life
Theodor Leschetizky was born on the estate of the family of Count Potocki in Łańcut. His father was a gifted pianist and music teacher of Viennese birth. His mother Therèse (von) Ulmann was a gifted singer of German origin. Leschetizky's father gave him his first piano lessons and then took him to Vienna to study with CzernyCarl Czerny
Carl Czerny was an Austrian pianist, composer and teacher. He is best remembered today for his books of études for the piano. Czerny's music was profoundly influenced by his teachers, Muzio Clementi, Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Antonio Salieri and Ludwig van Beethoven.-Early life:Carl Czerny was born...
. At age eleven he performed a Czerny piano concerto in Lemberg (near Łańcut), with Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart
Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart
Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart , also known as F. X. Mozart, W. A. Mozart Son, or Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Jr., was the youngest child of six born to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and his wife Constanze. He was the younger of his parents' two surviving children...
(the son of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...
) conducting. At the age of fourteen, he started to tutor his first pupils. By the age of eighteen he was a well-known virtuoso in Vienna and beyond. His composition teacher was Simon Sechter
Simon Sechter
Simon Sechter was an Austrian music theorist, teacher, organist, conductor and composer.Sechter was born in Friedberg , Bohemia, then part of the Austrian Empire, and moved to Vienna in 1804, succeeding Jan Václav Voříšek as court organist there in 1824. In 1810 he began teaching piano and voice...
, subsequently the teacher of Anton Bruckner
Anton Bruckner
Anton Bruckner was an Austrian composer known for his symphonies, masses, and motets. The first are considered emblematic of the final stage of Austro-German Romanticism because of their rich harmonic language, complex polyphony, and considerable length...
.
At the invitation of his friend Anton Rubinstein
Anton Rubinstein
Anton Grigorevich Rubinstein was a Russian-Jewish pianist, composer and conductor. As a pianist he was regarded as a rival of Franz Liszt, and he ranks amongst the great keyboard virtuosos...
he went to St. Petersburg to teach in the court of the Grand Duchess Helen. Remaining there from 1852 to 1877, he was one of the founders of the St. Petersburg Conservatory of Music in 1862. While in Russia he married one of his most famous pupils, Anna Yesipova
Anna Yesipova
Anna Yesipova was a prominent Russian pianist. Her name is cited variously as Anna Esipova; Anna or Annette Essipova; Anna, Annette or Annetta Essipoff; Annette von Essipow; Anna Jessipowa.Yesipova was one of Teodor Leszetycki's most brilliant pupils...
(the second of his four wives), and had two children (one of them Robert Leschetizky).
In 1878 he returned to Vienna and began teaching there, creating one of the most eminent private piano studios in history, besides Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt ; ), was a 19th-century Hungarian composer, pianist, conductor, and teacher.Liszt became renowned in Europe during the nineteenth century for his virtuosic skill as a pianist. He was said by his contemporaries to have been the most technically advanced pianist of his age...
in Weimar
Weimar
Weimar is a city in Germany famous for its cultural heritage. It is located in the federal state of Thuringia , north of the Thüringer Wald, east of Erfurt, and southwest of Halle and Leipzig. Its current population is approximately 65,000. The oldest record of the city dates from the year 899...
. He taught thousands of students, in the Weimarerstraße (formerly the Carl Ludwigstraße) XIX. Bezirk Wien
Wien
Wien is the German language name for Vienna, the city and federal state in Austria.* Wien , in Vienna, Austria* Theater an der Wien, a theater in Vienna located at the former river WienWien may also refer to:...
, Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
. They came from all over the world, many from the United States. Leschetizky taught until the age of 85, leaving for Dresden in 1915, where he died that year.
Leschetizky's descendants
He was survived by a son, Robert (Dresden), whose family returned to Bad IschlBad Ischl
Bad Ischl is a spa town in Austria. It lies in the southern part of Upper Austria, at the Traun River in the centre of the Salzkammergut region. The town consists of the Katastralgemeinden Ahorn, Bad Ischl, Haiden, Jainzen, Kaltenbach, Lauffen, Lindau, Pfandl, Perneck, Reiterndorf and Rettenbach...
after his death. His descendants still live in Bad Ischl and there is a Leschetizky Villa at the Leschetizky Straβe, the summer resort, where Theodor Leschetizky often vacationed with his friend Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist, and one of the leading musicians of the Romantic period. Born in Hamburg, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria, where he was a leader of the musical scene...
.
Leschetizky had a granddaughter, Ilse Leschetizky (1910–1997), who was a distinguished pianist and teacher. One of her daughters, Margret Tautschnig, continues the Leschetizky tradition with the Leschetizky Verein Ősterreich in Bad Ischl. This organisation was co-founded by the Belgian pianist Peter Ritzen
Peter Ritzen
Peter Ritzen Flemish pianist composer and conductor.Peter Ritzen studied piano and chamber music at the Royal Conservatory of his native city Ghent. He continued his training at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria, with the Russian pianist Tatiana Nikolayeva...
.
Herr Professor & his famous students
Among his celebrated Vorbereiter (assistants who prepared students to play for him) were Katharine GoodsonKatharine Goodson
Katharine Goodson was an English pianist.Born in Watford, Goodson studied the piano at the Royal Academy of Music in London; she also worked with Theodor Leschetizky in Vienna. Her London debut took place on January 16, 1897. The tours of Europe which followed placed her in the front rank of...
, Annette Hullah, Marie Prentner, and Malwine Brée, author of The Leschetizky Method (a title which he approved, while stating that there "was no method!"). The list of virtuoso concert artists he trained includes Anna Yesipova
Anna Yesipova
Anna Yesipova was a prominent Russian pianist. Her name is cited variously as Anna Esipova; Anna or Annette Essipova; Anna, Annette or Annetta Essipoff; Annette von Essipow; Anna Jessipowa.Yesipova was one of Teodor Leszetycki's most brilliant pupils...
, Ignaz Friedman
Ignaz Friedman
Ignaz Friedman Ignaz Friedman Ignaz Friedman (also spelled by languages Ignace or Ignacy; exactly Solomon (Salomon) Isaac Freudman(n), (February 13, 1882January 26, 1948) was a Polish pianist and composer. Critics (e.g. Harold C. Schonberg) and colleagues (e.g...
, Ignacy Jan Paderewski
Ignacy Jan Paderewski
Ignacy Jan Paderewski GBE was a Polish pianist, composer, diplomat, politician, and the second Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland.-Biography:...
, Artur Schnabel
Artur Schnabel
Artur Schnabel was an Austrian classical pianist, who also composed and taught. Schnabel was known for his intellectual seriousness as a musician, avoiding pure technical bravura...
, Mark Hambourg
Mark Hambourg
Mark Hambourg was a distinguished Russian-British concert pianist, among the most famous of his age.- Life :Mark Hambourg was the eldest son of the pianist Michael Hambourg , and was brother of the cellist Boris Hambourg and the violinist Jan Hambourg , and of the musical organiser Clement...
, Alexander Brailowsky
Alexander Brailowsky
Alexander Brailowsky was a Ukrainian French pianist who specialized in the works of Frédéric Chopin. He was a leading concert pianist in the years between the two World Wars.-Early life:...
, Benno Moiseiwitsch
Benno Moiseiwitsch
Benno Moiseiwitsch CBE was a Ukrainian-born British pianist.-Biography:Born in Odessa, Ukraine, Moiseiwitsch began his studies at age seven at the Odessa Music Academy. He won the Anton Rubinstein Prize when he was just nine years old. He later took lessons from Theodor Leschetizky in Vienna...
, and Mieczysław Horszowski.
Perhaps the secret of his successful teaching was that he worked with each student's personality and technical abilities in an individual way. His famous weekly classes provided his students the opportunity to try out their pieces prior to public performances before a discerning audience of their fellow students and invited guests.
A humorous probable allusion to Leschetizky occurs in the "Stella in Oxford" Chapter (Book Three, Chapter 10) of Compton Mackenzie
Compton Mackenzie
Sir Compton Mackenzie, OBE was a writer and a Scottish nationalist.-Background:Compton Mackenzie was born in West Hartlepool, England, into a theatrical family of Mackenzies, but many of whose members used Compton as their stage surname, starting with his grandfather Henry Compton, a well-known...
's 1913-1914 novel Sinister Street
Sinister Street
Sinister Street is a 1913-14 novel by Compton Mackenzie. It is a kind of bildungsroman or novel about growing up, and concerns two children, Michael Fane and his sister Stella...
, where there is mentioned a notable teacher of the piano in Vienna "with a perfectly impossible name beginning with L".
Until his death, Leschetizky espoused a philosophy of music-making and enjoying life to the fullest, captured in one of his most famous sayings (translated from the German):
- "No art without life, no life without art."
Leschetizky the composer
Theodor Leschetizky possessed a distinct talent for composition. He wrote over one hundred characteristic piano pieces, two operas: Die Bruder von San Marco and Die Erste Falte, thirteen songs, and a one-movement piano concerto. Opus numbers were given to 49 works.Although his piano pieces are primarily smaller works in the genre of salon music, they display an expressive lyric gift while exploiting the piano's capabilities to great effect. Most of Leschetizky's music has been out of print since the early twentieth century, with the exception of the Andante Finale, Op. 13 (a paraphrase for piano left hand on the famous sextet from the opera Lucia di Lammermoor
Lucia di Lammermoor
Lucia di Lammermoor is a dramma tragico in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Salvadore Cammarano wrote the Italian language libretto loosely based upon Sir Walter Scott's historical novel The Bride of Lammermoor....
by Donizetti
Gaetano Donizetti
Domenico Gaetano Maria Donizetti was an Italian composer from Bergamo, Lombardy. His best-known works are the operas L'elisir d'amore , Lucia di Lammermoor , and Don Pasquale , all in Italian, and the French operas La favorite and La fille du régiment...
); and Les deux alouettes, Op. 2, No. 1.
Recordings
- On February 1906, Theodor Leschetizky recorded twelve piano rollPiano rollA piano roll is a music storage medium used to operate a player piano, piano player or reproducing piano. A piano roll is a continuous roll of paper with perforations punched into it. The peforations represent note control data...
s for Welte-MignonWelte-MignonM. Welte & Sons, Freiburg and New York was a manufacturer of orchestrions, organs and reproducing pianos, established in Vöhrenbach by Michael Welte in 1832.-Overview:...
including seven of his own compositions. - Leschetizky Piano Concerto op.9/ Overture "Die erste Falte/ Contes de Jeunesses Peter RitzenPeter RitzenPeter Ritzen Flemish pianist composer and conductor.Peter Ritzen studied piano and chamber music at the Royal Conservatory of his native city Ghent. He continued his training at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria, with the Russian pianist Tatiana Nikolayeva...
, piano Naxos RecordsNaxos RecordsNaxos Records is a record label specializing in classical music. Through a number of imprints, Naxos also releases genres including Chinese music, jazz, world music, and early rock & roll. The company was founded in 1987 by Klaus Heymann, a German-born resident of Hong Kong.Naxos is the largest...
Catalogue No: 8.223803 - Leschetizky Piano Works (with the famous left hand piece Andante Finale op.13) Peter Ritzen, piano Naxos RecordsNaxos RecordsNaxos Records is a record label specializing in classical music. Through a number of imprints, Naxos also releases genres including Chinese music, jazz, world music, and early rock & roll. The company was founded in 1987 by Klaus Heymann, a German-born resident of Hong Kong.Naxos is the largest...
Catalogue No: 8.223525 - Leschetizky Piano Music CentaurCentaurIn Greek mythology, a centaur or hippocentaur is a member of a composite race of creatures, part human and part horse...
Records Catalogue No: CRC2319
Literature
- Malwine Brée: The groundwork of the Leschetizky method: issued with his approval / by Malwine Brée; with forty-seven illustrative cuts of Leschetizky's hand; translated from the German by Dr. Th. Baker. Mayence (Mainz), 1903.
- Malwine Brée: The Leschetizky method: a guide to fine and correct piano playing. English translation by Arthur Elson; introduction by Seymour Bernstein. Mineola, Dover Publications, 1997.
- Theodor Leschetizky: Das Klavierwerk. KölnKOLNKOLN, digital channel 10, is the CBS affiliate in Lincoln, Nebraska. It operates a satellite station, KGIN, on digital channel 11 in Grand Island. KGIN repeats all KOLN programming, but airs separate commercials...
(Cologne), Haas 2000. - Comtesse Angèle Potocka: Theodore Leschetizky, an intimate study of the man and the musician. New York, The Century co., 1903
- Annette Hullah: Theodor Leschetizky. London, Lane, 1906 (Reprinted 1923).
External links
- Theodor Leschetizky today playing his 1906 interpretations (The Welte Mignon Mystery vol. XIII)
- Piano Rolls (The Reproducing Piano Roll Foundation)
- Leschetizky Piano Concerto op. 9 /Overture/ Piano Pieces (Peter Ritzen, Piano) link
- Leschetizky Piano Works (Peter Ritzen, Piano) link
- Leschetizky Piano Music (Clara Park, Piano) link