Grażyna Bacewicz
- 05.02.1909 Łódź
- 17.01.1969 Warsaw
Despite her impressive playing and flawless technique, it was creative work that was to play first violin in the life of Grażyna Bacewicz. Combining Classical sonata form, Baroque-type orchestration and elements of folklore with contemporary techniques, to this day the composer remains one of the most important figures in Polish Neoclassicism.
I – if someone told me that I am to quit my violin career – would only be glad. […] I travel to give concerts, and compose only in passing, at night. That is not OK.
letter to her brother Witold, 1947
Trivia
As a teenager, Grażyna Bacewicz played the piano for silent film showings.
She was the critics’ favorite at the 1st Henryk Wieniawski International Violin Competition, which took place in 1935 in Warsaw. The day before the competition, her apartment was robbed, so that instead of giving herself over to practicing, she had to give depositions at the police station. The 1st Prize was won by Ginette Neveu; and the 2nd Prize, by David Oistrakh. Bacewicz played terribly, but did not admit to the audience why she was in such bad form.
She world-premièred her own violin works until the beginning of the 1960s. She abandoned violin-playing when her daughter adopted a cat who was horrifically afraid of the instrument’s highest notes.
The music community of Bacewicz’s day was extraordinarily masculinized; many people assumed that Grażyna Bacewicz was also a man. She received many letters beginning with such salutations as: ‘Dear Mister Bacewicz’ and ‘Cher Monsieur Grażyna Bacewicz’.
suggested works
length:
15'07'' I Moderato
Silesian String Quartet
length:
15'03'' I Allegro II Andante III Vivo
New London Orchestra; David Juritz (leader); Ronald Corp (conductor)
length:
20'24'' I Allegro molto II Andante III Allegro giocoso
Silesian String Quartet
length:
19'12'' I Allegro II Adagio III Vivace
New London Orchestra; David Juritz (leader); Ronald Corp (conductor)
length:
16'06'' I Allegro II Grave III Con vivezza
Silesian String Quartet
- teachers
- Kazimierz Sikorski (1895–1986)
- Nadia Boulanger (1887–1979)
- cities
- Paris
- Warsaw
- Lodz
- style/techniki
- neoclassicism
- dodecaphony
- sonorism
- folkloricism
- opis zdjęcia
- composer.acf.zdjecie_opis