Calendar
- 1913–23
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1913
25 January
Witold Lutosławski, the fourth child of Józef and Maria Lutosławski, is born in a maternity clinic at 6 Moniuszki Street, Warsaw.29 June
Baptism in Drozdowo. Witold is baptised by his uncle Kazimierz. Uncle Jan and aunt Maria are the godparents.Dear Kazimierz, I’m taking this opportunity while I’m travelling to write a few words to you. I sent you a telegraph to tell you about the birth of my son, who will have two names, Witold Jan. Maria feels better than she did during all previous labours. The clinic provides good professional care though without any special comforts. The labour lasted just 4 hours. I received a message in Drozdowo at 8:00 pm on Saturday and left for Warsaw at night.
(Józef Lutosławski writes to his brother Kazimierz, 29 January.)
[In the end the composer was named Witold Roman (in honour of Roman Dmowski who was a close friend of the Lutosławski family)].
1914
November
Józef Lutosławski and his brother Marian become involved in political activities of the Central Civic Committee, associated with the National Committee of Poland created by Roman Dmowski.When I came home, Witek was ill. He had a rash of some sort. The doctor scared us suggesting scarlet fever. But Witek’s health improved wonderfully.
(Józef Lutosławski writes to his brother Kazimierz, 2 February.)
1915
7 August
After the Central Powers troops break through the front line, Paulina Lutosławska leaves Drozdowo with Henryk and Witold. The next day they are joined by Maria and Józef with their eldest son Jerzy and the whole family goes to Moscow. They settle at 3 Srednya Presn where the brothers Marian, Józef and Kazimierz become actively involved in Polish colony in Russia.The spiritual atmosphere in the small manor in which the Lutosławski family lived exuded inner harmony and calm, rooted in deep faith, even when the future was at its most uncertain.
(Stanisław Grabski, Reminiscence.)
1916
The Lutosławski family lives in Moscow. The flat in Srednya Presn is occupied by Józef, his wife and children, uncle Marian, Mieczysław Niklewicz, and his family.
I was five when I left Moscow and a year and a half when I arrived. The only thing I remember is the flat. I remember the layout of the flat; such a thing, that doesn’t really matter.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1917
Marian and Józef prepare the transfer of Polish refugees to France nda England via Murmansk. After the October revolution the attitude towards Poles in Moscow turns hostile.
I remember how the events of 1917 began, the fires in Moscow. I can still see the fire in my mind and I recall the conversations. People said that the pharmacy was on fire. The flames were very colourful and hence, they knew that a big pharmaceutical store was on fire.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1918
23 April
Marian Lutosławski arrested; Józef arrested two days later.15 August
The Lutosławski children are sent to Poland under the care of Marian’s eldest daughter, Hania (later Hania Zalewska)5 September
The Bolsheviks execute The Lutosławski brothers. Towards the end of 1918 the family moves to Warsaw to a flat at 21 Marszałkowska Street.I remember just one moment from my father’s life at home and another one when we visited him in prison, because he and his brother Marian were arrested. It’s difficult to say for sure what the Bolsheviks accused them of; anyway, on Dzerzhinsky’s orders they were both sentenced to death and executed by firing squad on September 5th, 1918. I didn’t realize then what tragedy I was experiencing, what tragedy my family was experiencing. That came later.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1919
Little Witold begins piano lessons with Helena Hoffman. Maria Lutosławska works as a doctor at Miss Plater’s pension. From 1919 she also serves as a councillor for the Warsaw City Council.
Unfortunately music lessons were quite complicated in my childhood because we first lived in Warsaw and then spent two years in Drozdowo, and so I had to change my teachers. At the beginning there was this very good piano teacher, named Helena Hoffman. She might have been Strobel’s pupil. I benefited quite a lot from her tuition.
(Lutosławski on Drozdowo in conversation with Zofia Owińska 1992.)
1920
Maria Lutosławska begins work at the Ujazdowski Hospital. During summer holidays in Drozdowo the Lutosławskis are forced to evacuate because of war operations.
I saw my first concert at the Warsaw Philharmonic Hall; it was Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 conducted by Birnbaum. He was a conductor active at the time, the early 1920s. I have to say that the Warsaw Philharmonic and that time are for me associated with a period that I might call a period of my musical education. The Warsaw Philharmonic taught me music. Obviously, I’m not talking about piano playing or composition lessons, but these experiences of live performances in that hall played a fundamental role in my life and my development as a composer.
(Witold Lutosławski on the 90th anniversary of the Warsaw Philharmonic.)
1921
During holidays Maria Lutosławska reads Greek myths, sight translated from English, to her children.
We lived in a very patriotic and socially aware environment […] Our games reflected, therefore, the life of the adults: there was electoral canvassing, posters and then elections.
(Krystyna Niklewicz, Reminiscence.)
1922
Death of grandmother Paulina - the Lutosławski familty moves to Drozdowo for 2 years. Witek helps his mother in the pharmacy; he is making good progress in piano playing.
He goes for his lessons to Łomża, to Alina Rudnicka, a pupil of Michałowski.
He composes his first piece - Prelude for piano.
It was a very big house - a rather strange one. I think it contained at least thirty rooms. There were several separate flats for various members of the family, that is: for my grandmother, my parents, then for my mother and us, for the family of my father's brother, and so on. In other words, it was a real ”monster of a house,” housing various families as if various independent households.
(Lutosławski on Drozdowo in conversation with Zofia Owińska 1992.)
1923
Lutosławski decides to become a composer.
Last year spent in Drozdowo.
The place was captivating; there was a magnificent view over the Narew River valley from the garden. The fact that I spent the early years of my life in close contact with nature has influenced my character; I can still see those beautiful woods, fields, rivers, meadows, and gardens in my mind.
(Lutosławski on Drozdowo during a lecture in Kyoto 1993.)
- 1924–38
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1924
5 January
Death of uncle Kazimierz.11 April
A performance of Szymanowski’s Symphony No. 3 by the Warsaw Philharmonics makes a huge impression on the young Lutosławski.September
Lutosławski passes exams to the Stefan Batory High School - an élite school for boys in Warsaw.He presents his first compositions to Aleksander Michałowski and begins lessons with Józef Śmidowicz.
I was brought to Michałowski when I was 11 and I was told to play something. I played my own piece. […] When I finished playing, Michałowski turned to them and said: ”It does make sense, it does make sense”. This is what I remember from that visit. It was decided I would be taught by Śmidowicz.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1925
The family’s difficult financial situation forces Lutosławski to give up his lessons with Śmidowicz.
It was during my childhood, in 1924 or 1925, holidays in the countryside, a sultry Summer afternoon. By a happy coincidence, I lay my hands on several works by Ravel. I read Jeux d’eaux at the piano. I savoured and became infatuated with Ravel’s juicy harmonies, tasted for the very first time. I was under their spell and lived in a state of dizziness for the next few weeks.
(An undated radio programme.)
1926
Lutosławski begins violin lessons with Lidia Kmitowa.
Scared by the prospect of new five-finger exercises, I decided to learn to play the violin. Anyway, I was fascinated with the sound of the violin. And I learned the violin for six years under the guidance of Lidia Kmitowa.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Zofia Owińska 1992.)
1927
Encouraged by Kmitowa, Lutosławski begins private composition lessons with Witold Maliszewski.
Maliszewski listened to my pieces - I was 14 at the time - and decided to teach me. First, I went through a short course in harmony, counterpoint, and fugue, but also composition, because he didn’t want me to stop composing; he wanted me to compose freely just I as had done until then.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1928
Jerzy Lutosławski breaks off his studies at the Technical University to take care of the deteriorating Drozdowo estate.
During the seven years I spent there I saw that never before (and never since!) had there been such a well-equipped school in Poland. We were probably the first school in Poland to have an indoor swimming pool. There were many labs: physics, chemistry, natural sciences lab, crafts lab (with all kinds of metal working and woodworking machines); there was a music room and a gym, and outdoors lawns, gardens, an alpine garden, a huge football pitch, tennis courts and places for playing other games - all this was indeed very impressive.
(Lutosławsk’s reminisces in the book: Pochodem idziemy [Marching on] 1993.)
1929
The situation repeats itself - as it was the case with Śmidowicz, Lutosławski cannot afford his lessons with Maliszewski who was an expensive teacher. Yet Maliszewski decides to teach Lutosławski for free.
[Lutosławski recalls his conversation with Maliszewski when he told his professor that he could not afford the lessons anymore:] ”Witold, you will keep coming to me and I will neither demand nor expect anything from you. So I said: ”Professor, this is very embarrassing for me. I don’t know if I can.” And he answered as follows: ”Look, when you are a mature composer and you meet someone who will want to learn something from you but will have no money, you will teach him”.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1930
Lutosławski composes : Dance of the Chimera, and his first orchestral piece - Scherzo. On January 20, Scherzo was performed at the Qui Pro Quo theatre in Warsaw. Presumably, it was the first public performance Lutosławski's composition.
It might have been in 1930 when Witold approached me during a break between lessons and proposed I join the ”revellers” he was organising. I didn't really know what this was all about (we both learned French, not English, at school), but when he said we would sing cabaret songs - I lit up with pleasure.
(Reminiscences by Wiesław Rago - Lutosławski's friend from high school.)
1931
After passing his final high school examinations, Lutosławski is admitted to the Warsaw University to study mathematics, together with his friend Andrzej Mostowski.
[Recalling Andrzej Mostowski years later:] he was a lecturer at the Warsaw University, a professor who nurtured whole generations of mathematicians and logicians, because mathematical logic was his speciality. But this man was talented. He always knew, when he was proving a theorem, what the stages of this theorem were, even if they didn’t follow logically from what one started. I used to ask him: ”How do you know that?” ”Hard to say,” was his answer.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1932
Lutosławski is admitted to year seven at the Warsaw Conservatory. He studies piano with Jerzy Lefeld and form with Maliszewski.
I wanted to be taught by Lefeld because I was convinced that this man would not tell me to start from the beginning, from five-finger exercises, but that I would simply start playing music.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
I remember that -- during my entrance exam to the conservatory -- I played: Prelude and Fugue in B flat minor from Book I of Das Wohltemperierte Klavier, Mozart’s C minor concerto, and Chopin’s Study in G flat major from op. 10. Quite a good repertoire. I don’t remember the rest of it. Anyway, I was accepted to a higher lever course, much to my surprise of course.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Zofia Owińska 1992.)
1933
The first performance of a work by Lutosławski at the Warsaw Philharmonic Hall: Haroun al Rashid (conducted by Józef Ozimiński ).
Lutosławski gives up his studies of mathematics.
The most impressive of all was a ballet fragment entitled Haroun al Rashid by Witold Lutosławski who is most comfortable with compositional technique and who is able to use successfully a unique orchestral colouring.
(Jan Maklakiewicz in ”Kurier poranny” [”Morning Courier”] of 1 June.)
1934
Lutosławski composes Piano Sonata and two songs to Kazimiera Iłłakowiczówna’s poems.
When I was a student, Grażyna Bacewicz had already given her first composer’s recital; it was at the Warsaw Conservatory, on 10 May 1934. It was a memorable evening for me also, because of the fact that, as Jerzy Lefeld’s student at the time, I was his page-turner when he accompanied Grażyna. I was particularly enthusiastic about a truly beautiful miniature entitled Witraż [Stained Glass] woven out of tones as colourful and delicate as the wing of a butterfly.
(”Ruch Muzyczny” 1969 nr.7)
1935
16 February
Lutosławski performs his Sonata at a concert at the Warsaw Philharmonic Hall.May
The Conservatory students go to Riga and Vilnius. Meeting with Karol Szymanowski.Lutosławski gets in touch with Spółdzielnia Autorów Filmowych (Film Authors Cooperative) and begins working for the radio as a controller of radio programmes.
The whole stay in Riga was a very pleasant event. Szymanowski was extremely friendly towards our little group. He came to our concert; we followed him all over the city and went to the Riga radio where he was recording his works with Wacław Niemczyk and his sister Stanisława. After our concert, Wacław Niemczyk said to me: ”Karol liked your Sonata very much, but the thing is, he will not tell you this”.
(Lutosławski’s statement noted down by Elżbieta Markowska in 1981.)
1936
Lutosławski finishes his piano studies.
I remember the programme of my diploma recital very well. I played Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in D major from Book II of Das Wohltemperierte Klavier, Beethoven’s G major concerto, and Prokofiev’s Variations from the Third Concerto, a sonata by Mozart (I don’t remember which one now), Beethoven’s Les adieux, and also -- what I would call a competitive piece - Schumann’s Toccata op. 7, plus Chopin’s two studies and Fourth Ballad, Liszt’s arrangement of Caprice 24 (well, to be precise I mixed his version with Busoni’s). And I also played a piano arrangement of a fragment from a ballet by composition professor, Maliszewski (Sailors’ song from the ballet-opera Syreny [The Mermaids]).
(Lutosławski in conversation with Zofia Owińska 1992.)
1937
Composition diploma.
From 1937 until the beginning of the war Lutosławski lives in Komorów near Warsaw with his mother’s sister, Janina Zaporska.
28 May
Fugue for orchestra performed at a student concert at the Warsaw Philharmonic Hall under Walerian Bierdiajew’s baton.After receiving his diploma Lutosławski does his military service at the Officer Cadet School in Zegrze.
Finally, I prepared this wretched diploma. The concert featured a performance of my Fugue for orchestra. A bad composition, but I didn’t have anything else, so I recall it with regret. Fugue was performed at the concert and at the exam I showed all: fugues, previous compositions, Sonata, and various smaller pieces and songs. I had to present all of this in order to receive the diploma. The diploma project proper consisted of those two fragments from the Requiem.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1938
After completing his military service, Lutosławski returns to composition.
15 November
He finishes his Symphonic Variations begun two years before. It is Lutosławski’s first important work. He also works on the Kurpie Suite and Piano Concerto, which will never be finished.The army proved to be a cure for my depression. I went there for a year and the depression vanished without a trace. I came back rejuvenated and got down to work on Symphonic Variations, which I completed in a month and a half.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
- 1939–44
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1939
17 June
Concert premiere of Symphonic Variations in Kraków under Grzegorz Fitelberg.1-20 September
Lutosławski takes part in the September campaign and serves in the signals and radio unit of the Kraków Army (20 Sep: Taken prisoner by the Germans). After escaping from captivity, he manages to make his way back to Warsaw where he settles with his mother in Kolonia Staszica in Langiewicza Street.In 1939, after graduating from the Warsaw Conservatory, I was planning to go to Paris and study with Nadia Boulanger, but I was conscripted. I served as radio operator in an army unit.
The sensitivity of my pianistic fingers helped me a lot, and so did the fact that my platoon included privates and non-commissioned officers of the reserve who simply were out of practice.
1940
Lutosławski earns his living by accompanying a popular cabaret group at the Ziemiańska café.
He soon forms a piano duo with Andrzej Panufnik. At first, they perform at the Aria café (where Lutosławski meets his future wife, Danuta Bogusławska).
7 October
Lutosławski’s brother, Henryk, dies in Kolyma.Lutosławski composes Two Studies.
Sometimes we would play jazz for fun, especially Duke Ellington and the best Americans, and even -- which was dangerous -- the music of forbidden Jewish composers such as Gershwin. Occasionally -- to relieve boredom, because we played every day -- we put ourselves at a completely different risk by improvising our own jazz pieces. Before we began, we would sketch out a diagram specifying the tempo and harmonic progression in a specific number of bars.
Using this piece of paper we would invent a melody, counterpoints and rhythmic formulas; running the risk of one of us getting carried away by his unbridled imagination. However, the audience never learned our secret: that we were improvising instead of performing already composed and carefully prepared pieces”.
(Andrzej Panufnik on himself.)
1941
Encouraged by a waiter at the Aria café - also a harpist at the philharmonic orchestra - Lutosławski composes Variations on a Theme by Paganini. The Panufnik-Lutosławski duo moves to the ”U aktorek” [”The actresses’ ”] café.
We had a lot of very serious music in our repertoire, from Bach’s organ toccatas -- which we adapted more faithfully than Busoni or Liszt, because two pianos offered possibilities one piano obviously couldn’t -- to Ravel’s Bolero, which was our ’cheval de bataille’.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Zofia Owińska.)
1942
The Panufnik-Lutosławski duo moves to the Sztuka i Moda [Art and Fashion] café.
29 July
Lutosławski performs Szymanowski’s violin works with Eugenia Umińska at the Iwaszkiewicz’s villa in Stawisko.Yesterday [29 July 1942] Umińska played at our house with her quartet. It was a beautiful but very hot summer day. They came just after lunch and soon began to play […] In addition, Umińska, accompanied by Witek Lutosławski, played a few of Karol’s pieces for violin; […] everyone was pleased. They say that our drawing room has excellent acoustics and besides, they knew that although they played for just a few people, they played for people who loved music very much. […] After the afternoon tea and some good wine, which I had gotten from somewhere shortly before that, we saw them off at the train station.
The whole group, including us, looked rather funny, stretched along the path leading to the station. […] We looked like a band of itinerant musicians lost in the wood. The moon was coming out. It was probably the happiest day during the Nazi occupation.
(Jarosłąw Iwaszkiewicz: Notes 1939-1945.)
1943
1943-1944 komponuje pięć piosenek na głos i fortepian (wydane jako Pieśni walki podziemnej).
1 października
Koncert benefisowy dla uczczenia trzyletniej działalności koncertowej duetu Panufnik - Lutosławski.Któregoś dnia (12 VII) była tam łapanka. [...] Wszystkich rewidowali, potem na samochód i na Pawiak. Panufnik, który dobrze mówił po niemiecku, bo studiował dyrygenturę u Weingartnera w Wiedniu, powiedział żołnierzowi, że musi wziąć płaszcz, który zostawił w kuchni. [...] Tak więc, kiedy jeden z właścicieli zobaczył Panufnika, powiedział: „O, jeszcze dwóch muzyków u nas pracuje”. Hauptmann chciał aresztować tylko gości, więc zażyczył sobie listy pracowników. Właściciel wskazał również na mnie - ja już byłem zrewidowany i miałem iść do samochodu - i wypuścili nas obu.
(Lutosławski w rozmowie z Iriną Nikolską.)
1944
July
The Lutosławskis go to Komorów to Witold's mother's sister - Janina Zaporska. After the fall of the Warsaw Uprising the family goes to Kraków.The house in which I lived was requisitioned for headquarters of one of the Home Army groups […] Therefore I decided to take my mother to her sister in Komorów, hoping to be back probably in a few days. Which didn't happen, because though I did come back, it wasn't until April 1945 […]
I spent the uprising with my family, that is, with my mother's sister and brother-in-law in Komorów in a villa to which many homeless Varsovians kept coming to come. That is why I decided to move to the attic where I lived and wrote various pieces, including polyphonic exercises for several clarinets, oboe and bassoon. They were simply exercises in musical language.
The first result of those exercises was Trio, which I also wrote in that attic.
(In conversation with Zofia Owińska.)
- 1945–55
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1945
April 1945 - March 1946 Lutosławski works as head of classical music department at Polish radio (the only in-house job in his life).
The Lutosławski family lives in a rented flat at 22 Aleja Waszyngtona [Washington Avenue]
21 October
Premiere of Wind Trio (composed during the war).Lutosławski is elected treasurer of the Polish Composers’ Union.
7 September
Lutosławski becomes a member of ZAiKS (Association of Writers and Composers for the Stage), in its classical and film music unit.… the first piece I completed after the war - before completing the First Symphony which I wrote during the occupation but finished in 1947 - […] was a work based on folk themes, a work written at a time when there was no socialist realism yet.
It was just a request or a proposal from Tadeusz Ochlewski, the then director of the PWM [Polish Publishing House for Music], who wanted me to write easy pieces for pianists, for music schools. They became Folk Melodies on folk themes.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Stanisław Będkowski.)
1946
22 July
Zbigniew Drzewiecki premieres Folk Melodies.1946 Lutosławski composes 20 Carols for voice and piano commissioned by PWM (Polskie Wydawnictwo Muzyczne - Polish Publishing House for Music)
26 October
Lutosławski marries Danuta Bogusławska. The Lutosławskis move into a three-bedroom apartment at 39 Zwycięzców Street in the Saska Kępa disctrict with their respective mothers, a housekeeper, and Marcin Bogusławski, Danuta’s son from her first marriage.5 December
Symphonic Variations performed at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris in the presence of the composer. Lutosławski stays in Paris for about 3 months and meets the legendary Nadia Boulanger.In 1946 I went to France for the first time because UNESCO organised a series of concerts and each country (each UNESCO member) presented its own concerts.
Since Poland was a member of the UNESCO, a Polish concert, conducted by Fitelberg, took place as well. […] And Fitelberg put my Symphonic Variations as the first item on the programme.
”I devoured Paris”. I went to concerts, to the opera, to all possible museums; I visited galleries, the region around Paris; I went to Saint Germain-en-Laye. I did what a young man does when he comes to Paris for the first time.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1947
Summer
Trip to Copenhagen for the ISCM Festival.Symphony No. 1 completed (first sketches come from 1941).
More functional pieces: Six children’s songs to words by Tuwim and Two children’s songs to words by Tuwim.
Some received the carols as a new, unexpected and attractive rendition of old melodies. Others - on the contrary - resented my lack of respect for tradition, believing that some of its demands, with respect to the harmony and even texture, are contained in the melodies. What can I say in my defense in view of such an accusation? Probably, only that my work was full of genuine affection for old carols and was a faithful reflection of what those melodies inspired in my tonal imagination.
(Lutosławski’s commentary in the Veriton recording.)
1948
8 January
Lutosławski begins his cooperation with Teatr Polski in Warsaw. He will continue to write incidental music for the theatre until 1959.1 April
Premiere of Symphony No. 1 during a closed concert.Lutosławski goes to Amsterdam for the ISCM Festival.
September - 3 December
A tour of France together with the Małcużyńskis - his last trip to the West before the closure of the iron curtain.December
Lutosławski receives the City of Warsaw Music Prize for 1948.I got very excited by your plans to come to Warsaw with the orchestra. When would that be? You and your orchestra are a true and good world which I long for. It’s only corruption here in Warsaw.
(Letter to Fitelberg of 12 April)
I got a letter from Witek Małcużyński; he’s inviting us to visit him in the south of France at the end of summer. Of course, I’m very keen on this trip, especially given the fact that, as you know, I’m planning a piano concerto - with Witek as the soloist in mind. Therefore, a personal contact with him over a couple of weeks would be very ? propos.
(Letter to Fitelberg of 26 May.)
1949
5-8 August
Lutosławski takes part in the Łagów congress where his works are also performed. He only speaks on points of the agenda at the beginning of the session.20 December
The song, Lawina [Snowslide], wins Lutosławski the second prize at a competition celebrating Pushkin's 150th birthday.In 1949 there was this famous congress in Łagów during which minister Sokorski spoke for four and a half hours explaining to the composers gathered there what their current tasks were.
Zbigniew Drzewiecki, who was present there, took me by the elbow and said: ”Well? What do you think? This is a funeral for Polish music. This is the end”. That's what he said. I thought that what had happened and what would happen from then on would last till the end of my life.
I would write what I want without any hope of publication, while my utilitarian music would be performed in public. […]
The situation in which we lived was terrible.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1950
Festival and congress in Prague.
16-19 June
Lutosławski does not speak at the 5th Congress of the Polish Composers’ Union despite encouragement from Sokorski who also wants to persuade him to write a big instrumental-vocal work.September
Lutosławski receives second prize at a mass songs competition.Soon after my return, I went to a composers’ conference with Sokorski. So, a return to the 19th century (!), decidedly a move away from ”modernism”, etc. Endlessly. This time I didn’t keep silent; I said a few bitter words. I wasn’t alone; others said similar things, but will that be of any use to us? It’s hard to say. Anyway, people here are still defiant, unlike people in Czechoslovakia.
(Letter to Fitelberg of 25 May.)
1951
Lutosławski composes a song cycle for children, Słomkowy łańcuszek [Straw Chain], Silesian Triptych, and Dziesięć Pieśni żołnierskich [Ten Soldiers’ Songs].
December
First prize at the Polish Music Festival for children’s music and for Silesian Triptych in the orchestral music category.September
Trip to the USSR.December
Lutosławski elected to the audit, arbitration, and repertoire committee of the Polish Composers’ Union.I also wrote songs for the army. They all had very innocent lyrics, with no politics involved whatsoever. And so, I wrote a song about tanks. The Polish Army House organised a concert of those songs. […] It was in the 1950s - probably 1951.
So there was this song that I wrote about tanks but they had substituted the original lyrics and put in some words about Stalin - without my knowledge!
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1952
25 January
Lutosławski conducts the Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra at Fitelberg’s invitation. The programme includes his Symphonic Variations and songs as well as Joseph Haydn’s Symphony No. 92.27 September - 5 October
He goes to Berlin for the musical festival.November
Lutosławski becomes the head of the programme committee of the PWM (Polish Publishing House for Music).Witold Lutosławski has completed a cycle of eight children’s songs for mezzosoprano and orchestra. At the moment he is working on Concerto for Orchestra based on creatively transformed folk melodies.
(”Muzyka” 1952 No. 1/2.)
1953
23 March
Lutosławski records Bucolics and Three Easy Pieces for the radio.We cannot allow the music written today to have all the features of works created sixty years ago. Such music will lack one of the most important qualities of a real work of art - the artistic truth.
(”Muzyka” 1953.)
1954
1 August
Lutosławski finishes Concerto for Orchestra, his most popular work.26 November
The premiere at the Roma theatre (conducted by Witold Rowicki).1 June
Prime Minister Award for his works for children and young people.Concerto [for Orchestra] is a testimony to how I can write music and not to how I would like to write it. Hence my lack of enthusiasm for this work.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Izabella Grzenkowicz 1979.)
1955
May
Lutosławski goes to Helsinki for the Sibelius Festival where he meets the venerable composer.22 July
Lutosławski receives first class State Award.A performance of Concerto for Orchestra opens the 5th Chopin Competition. Lutosławski is a member of the jury.
Once in my life I was a member of the jury of the Chopin Competition in Warsaw. I had to listen to Chopin’s music many hours a day for a few weeks. It was a really terrible ordeal for my perception of this music. And yet, despite the hordes of participants ”murdering” Chopin’s music in the first stage, -- despite the fact that I had to listen to, for example, the same average performance of the B minor Sonata several times a day, despite the impossibility of doing something else at that time -- I remember this period of intense communion with Chopin’s music with great emotion.
(Fragment from the article Powroty [Returns], "Polska" 1970 No. 9.)
- 1956–60
-
1956
21-30 January
Lutosławski represents Poland at the Mozart Festival in Salzburg.Little Suite and Concerto for Orchestra performed and the 1st Warsaw Autumn Festival.
In fact, it was a review of various interpretative styles and in addition, an opportunity to spring some surprises. We had, for instance, a modest orchestra of the Salzburg Music Academy under Bernhard Paumgartner, which gave an exemplary performance of the A major Symphony. On the other hand, the festival’s unofficial vedette, --Herbert Von Karajan, conducting the London Philharmonia orchestra, a high class conductor -- disappointed me seriously with his performance of both the E flat major Symphony and D minor Concerto (with Clara Haskil as the soloist). Karajan’s Mozart lacked lightness, freedom, and breath.
(Witold Lutosławski’s report in Przegląd kulturalny [Culture review] 1956 No. 10)
1957
9-10 March
Lutosławski presides over the Polish Composers’ Union congress.31 March
Lutosławski registers the pseudonym Derwid with ZAiKS (Association of Writers and Composers for the Stage); he will write over 30 popular songs as Derwid.28 August
Lutosławski completes the piano version of Five Songs to Kazimiera Iłłakowiczówna’s poems.Summer
The Lutosławskis go (for the first time together) with the Małcużyńskis to Italy. On their way there they visit Markiewicz at Nadia Boulanger’s 70th birthday celebrations.For the first time in a long time, our congress takes place in an atmosphere of genuine creative freedom. No one will be persecuted for the so-called formalism; no one will prevent delegates from expressing their aesthetic views, regardless of what particular composers represent.
(Speech at the Polish Composers' Union Congress.)
1958
26 March
Premiere of Funeral Music (Jan Krenz conducts Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra).Lutosławski composes numerous songs under the pseudonym Derwid, including Warszawski dorożkarz [Warsaw cabbie].
A delegation of Polish musicians (Bacewicz, Lutosławski and Umińska) goes to Strasbourg.
First entries in Zeszyt myśli [Notebook of Ideas].
1959
15 January
Lutosławski receives annual award of the Polish Composers’ Union.May
Funeral Music selected (together with Baird’s 4 Essays) as the most important work at the annual session of the International Rostrum of Composers.Lutosławski becomes the first Pole to be elected to the ISCM executive committee (he will remain its member until 1965).
10-16 June
Jury member at the ISCM Festival in Rome.Lutosławski becomes a member of the repertoire committee of the Warsaw Autumn Festival.
1960
January
Derwid’s song Nie oczekuję dziś nikogo [I’m not waiting for anybody tonight] sung by Rena Rolska becomes the radio song of the month.Cage’s Concert for Piano and Orchestra heard on the radio inspires Lutosławski to write his Venetian Games.
10 - 19 June
During the International Festival of Contemporary Music in Cologne, Lutosławski is elected vice-president of the ISCM.September
Lutosławski takes part in a composers’ conference in Dubrovnik.28 January
When I look at the catalogue of my compositions, I’m terrified by the number of entries whose value is little more than that of their titles.(Letter to Lissa.)
In 1960 it became very clear to me that I couldn’t materialise all those different ideas accumulated in my imagination. It was then that I heard a fragment of John Cage’s Second Piano Concerto. A composer very often listens to music very actively: for example, what he hears is only an impulse that launches his imagination; he hears what plays in his imagination rather than what he is really listening to. This is what happened with Cage’s Concerto. I listened to it only for a moment and suddenly, I realised that all those ideas accumulated in my imagination could be liberated in a way I had never used. I immediately stopped everything I was working on and started to write Venetian Games.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
- 1961–9
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1961
24 April
Andrzej Markowski premieres Venetian Games (finished barely a month earlier) at the festival in Venice.19 May
Lutosławski delivers a lecture at the 1st Zagreb Biennale: ”On the development of contemporary musical language”.11-20 January
He takes part in the ISCM session in Vienna.16 September
The final version of Venetian Games performed at the Warsaw Autumn Festival.
1962
22 July
Lutosławski receives lifetime achievement award from the Minister of Culture award (1st class).First trip to the USA for lectures at Tanglewood. Meeting with Varese in New York and a visit to Babbit's electronic studio in New York.
8 February
Art criticism is nothing more than a literary genre. It's a parasitic genre, because the subject of a critical article is not the creation of the critic, but the author of the artwork in question.The so-called background music is a kind of noise or buzz that accompanies all human activities. In my opinion the influence of this ”music” is anaesthetising, killing our ability to perceive all kinds of acoustic sensations.
(From the Notebook of Ideas.)
1963
9 May
Premiere of Trois poemes d’Henri Michaux at the Second Muzicki Biennale festival in Zagreb arouses great enthusiasm. A year later the work receives a Koussevitzky Foundation Award.The composer conducts the performance - for the first time in many years. From this point on, conducting his works will become a tradition.
August
Lectures at the Dartington Summer School of Music.When I hear the question: ”Is it music?”, I wonder why it is asked so often these days. Does the output of today’s’ avant-garde composers differ so much from what the majority believes to be music? Aware of several phenomena occurring in music created today, I have to answer in the affirmative.
Indeed, the difference between certain works created recently and, say, the music of Webern or even his immediate followers seems greater, more significant than the difference between Webern and Baroque music.
(It is music - a BBC radio talk.)
1964
10 - 12 January
Seminar devoted to criticism during which Lutosławski gives a lecture entitled ”The composer and the listener”.28 May- 3 June
Jury member at the ISCM Festival in Copenhagen.22 July
Lutosławski receives first-class State Award (the only composer to receive it).December
Lutosławski finishes String Quartet. (commissioned by the Swedish radio)
1965
12 March
LaSalle Quartet premieres String Quartet at the Museum of Contemporary Art in StockholmApril
Lutosławski completes Paroles tissées .25 September
LaSalle Quartet performs String Quartet at the Warsaw Autumn Festival.It’s high time I described the main features of this type of aleatorism, which for a few years has been the subject of my own compositional experiments and which I could call ”limited” or ”controlled aleatorism” or perhaps ”aleatorism of texture”.
In order to make this concept more specific, I’ll quote here Meyer-Eppler’s well-known definition: ”aleatory processes are such processes which have been fixed in their outline but the details of which are left to chance”. Musical works composed in accordance with this definition don’t really go beyond the main conventions and traditions typical of European music. […] Aleatorism, thus defined, may seem to provide little innovation. It is true that it does not greatly change the perception of a musical work as an ”object in time”, but it does radically change it rhythmic and expressive physiognomy; and it is enough for the music composed in the manner I have been talking about, to sound totally different from the music to which chance does not apply.
(From a lecture given at the Royal Swedish Academy of Music in Stockholm in March 1965.)
1966
August
Second trip to the USA. Eight of Lutosławski’s works are performed at the Hopkins Centre Art Festival Lutosławski meets and becomes friends with Mario di Bonaventura - an American conductor and the festival’s director. In New York Lutosławski receives the Jurzykowski Award.17 September
Meeting with Mstislav Rostropovich that will lead to the creation of Cello Concerto.18 October
First performance of the second part of Symphony No. 2 by the Hamburg Radio Orchestra conducted by Pierre Boulez.1966 - Lutosławski signs with the Hansen (later Chester) publishing house.
During one of our subsequent meetings Rostropovich played Britten’s Suite for cello solo especially for me. He wanted to bring me closer to his playing, which in a private apartment was different from what it was in the concert hall.He also asked me at that time to play tape recordings of my compositions for him. I played a tape with Paroles tisées. He studied the score very carefully while listening to the tape and at the end he said: ”I would like to play such music.” and after a moment: ”I would like to play this music”. This made me think a lot. He also added something very significant: ”I’m still young for an artist and I have already played the whole cello repertoire; I would now like to play music I have never ever played”.
(Conversations with Tadeusz Kaczyński.)
1967
Lutosławski receives the Herder Prize in Vienna and the Leonie Sonning Prize in Copenhagen. As a result, his financial situation improves considerably and he can afford to buy a house.
The first book on the composer published - Stefan Jarociński’s Materiały do monografii [Materials for a monograph].
18 October
Death of Maria Lutosławska.The thing is that even if music can evoke associations with the rich world of human feelings, these associations can be very different for different people. Hence a simple conclusion: it does not matter whether the composer wrote his work under the influence of some extra-musical impulses; whether the work is associated in his mind or subconscious with some cycle of events; or whether the composer himself sees an image of something that could be described with words. All this belongs to the sources of musical inspiration.
For me, however, it never becomes the ultimate goal of a musical work. That is why - just like many other composers - I would not be able to say what exactly the music I wrote expresses.
(Conversations with Tadeusz Kaczyński.)
1968
May
Second Symphony comes first at the UNESCO International Rostrum of Composers.Summer
Masterclass in Aarhus.Lutosławski buys a modest villa in the Żoliborz district of Warsaw (39 Śmiała Street) where he can finally work in his dream sound-proof study.
18 November
Premiere of Livre pour orchestre at the Hagener Musiktage Festival.When constructing large, closed forms, I realise that this work involves mainly organising the perception of my piece. For me a musical work is not only a sequence of sounds in time, but also a sequence of impulses that these sounds provide to the listener’s psyche, and reactions these impulses in turn trigger in the listener.
The knowledge of these impulses and reactions cannot be based solely on the experiences of the composer as listener and his conviction that among the other possible listeners there will be a certain number reacting in a similar way.
(Notes on the Construction of Large-Scale Forms [After Postcriptum].)
1969
11 May
Concert at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam with Trois poemes (Lutosławski conducts the chorus) and Funeral Music.July
Conducts Jeunesse Musicale camp in Olsztyn.20 September
Polish premiere of Livre pour orchestre at the Warsaw Autumn Festival.28 October
Lutosławski day at the Contemporary Music Days in Paris (five of his works are performed).I was introduced to sailing 14 years ago by the commodore of the Yacht Club of Poland, Tadeusz Schuch, who took me on my first sailing trip - on the Vistula River to the town of Kazimierz and back. Soon, I bought an old Słonka class yacht on which I sailed for a while and finally I built an L class boat. It served me for many seasons on the Mazurian Lakes and is still going strong […]. The elements - water and wind - are capricious, varied, and unpredictable, which makes them similar to a living being. And this is why playing with them is so fascinating, just as …well, playing with life.
(Interview for the ”Żagle” [”Sails”] magazine.)
- 1970–9
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1970
July
Cello Concerto completed.14 October
Premiere of Cello Concerto in London.I’m in a difficult period now, full of unpleasant experiences. Despite that, I keep working on Cello Concerto, trying to do my best to preserve my spiritual independence from the external world -- a prerequisite for my work.
(Letter Mario di Bonaventura /09.06.)
I realised that what had been created was exactly what I had dreamed of. Before I started playing it, I already knew, looking at the score that Lutosławski had composed the music I wanted.
Mstislav Rostropovich in conversation with Mieczysław Kominek, „Studio” 1994, No. 3.
1971
First honorary doctorate (Cleveland).
Ravel Prize for lifetime achievement.
Honorary membership of the Polish Composers’ Union.
But one day, if you are patient and talented enough, suddenly, out of the blue a sequence of sounds will emerge and amaze you. For this sequence will contain a huge number of possibilities for employing it. In addition, this sequence will resemble nothing you have ever known. This will be a significant moment - it will be the birth of the composer’s individuality […]
(Speech at the Commencement in Cleveland 2.VI )
1972
Lutosławski begins work on a new symphony commissioned by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Publication of Tadeusz Kaczyński’s Conversations with Lutosławski.
12 October
Premiere of Preludes and Fugue (first title: x+1) in Weiz near Graz.December
Visit to Moscow for the Russian premiere of Cello Concerto.
1973
60th birthday
January
Concerts with the London Sinfonietta. Lutosławski writes a letter to The Times in defence of the orchestra which is experiencing financial difficulties.Lutosławski receives the Polish Composers' Union Award and becomes the Union's vice-president (he will hold that post until 1979).
June
Warsaw University awards honorary doctorate to Lutosławski.Autumn
Lutosławski receives the Sibelius Prize.30 September
Heinrich Schiff performs Cello Concerto at the Warsaw Autumn Festival together with Preludes and Fugue.2 October
A recital by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau inspires another work for voice and orchestra.Science and art: two areas of human activity, two creation of human spirit, seemingly so different and yet having so many things in common. Here is not a time nor place to delve into the differences mentioned, but I would like to draw your attention to one of them, or, rather, to remind you of it. I mean the goal of science and the goal of art; and, in addition, the possibility of specifying them. The goal of science is obvious to all of us and can be described with one word: knowledge. When we try to specify the goal of art, our thought stops as if in front of a wall made of fog, a wall behind which we cannot see anything very clearly. No definition satisfies us; all seem to be missing the point, are imprecise, irrelevant. Despite the fact that for everyone who experiences, and thus creates art, this goal is obvious.
(From a speech during the honorary doctorate award ceremony at the Warsaw University.)
1974
Lutosławski conducts the Berliner Philhamoniker.
A series of programmes on the Polish Radio ”Witold Lutosławski’s works” presented by Tadeusz Kaczyński.
Publication of Balint Andras Varga’s Lutosławski Profile, an in-depth interview with the composer.
I’m interested in the substance of music and not in its direct impact on the listeners. It’s the substance that enables a composition to live.
Even the tiniest detail has to satisfy the composer’s sensibility to the utmost. In other words, there can be no indifferent sounds in music.
(Conversation with Balint Andras Varga.)
1975
Lutosławski composes Les espaces du sommeil dedicated to Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (completed on 17 Nov.).
Sacher Variation for solo cello composed for Paul Sacher’s 70th birthday.
I will now tell you how I composed the music to Chabrun’s poem. The starting point was to treat each part separately. I assumed that each had its own physiognomy and character, and hence its own musical image. What was important to me were new words appearing in successive parts. Of course this does not apply to part one, which presents material to be then repeated. Already in part two, I used the rudiments of the new content to determine its nature. Quand le jour a rouvert les branches du jardin - that is the beginning of this quasi-tale, rendered by solo singing without accompaniment. In part three, music takes from the text its dramatic mood, an element of violence.
In part four, beginning with the words: Dormez cette paleur nous est venue de loin, I understand the word ”pallor” as deathly pallor. I assume that this part deals with the death of the alleged protagonists - an allusion to the deaths of the chatelaine and the prince. And finally part three, which I called dramatic, is in a way an explosion and a tragic resolution of the conflict.
This interpretation is fully subjective. One could say that I wrote music to a text that does not contain anything I had construed myself. Yet, I feel authorised to do so by the title and allusions scattered throughout the text.
(Lutosławski during the masterclasses in Baranów.)
1976
22 October
Premiere of Mi-parti at the Amsterdam ConcertgebouwEMI records a six-album collection of Lutosławski’s most important works (released three years later).
Publication of Bogdan Pociej’s Lutosławski a wartość muzyki [Lutosławski and the value of his music]
Publication of Lidia Rappoport’s book on Lutosławski in the USSR.
First meetings in Baranów in which Lutosławski takes part.
I should perhaps be able to predict all the possible versions of my text, as a result of the introduction of the ad libitum collective playing, and compose this text in such a way that all the versions would fulfil all requirements specified at the beginning. Yet, in most cases, it is impossible to envision all possible versions. In fact, it is not even necessary.
It is enough to compose just one version of a given section of the form, namely the one which, from the point of view of the original intention, could be called the ”least advantageous” version. In other words: out of all possible situations that may arise as a result of the overlapping of elements of my tonal vision in an ad libutum performance, I choose the one that is furthest from my intentions. I then transform the overlapping elements if necessary, so that even in this ”least advantageous” situation they would fulfil their tasks in accordance with the original intent.
(Lutosławski during the masterclasses in Baranów.)
1977
21 July
The composer is awarded the Order of the Builders of People’s Poland.Lutosławski is a guest at Rostropovich’s competition in La Rochelle. Lutosławski’s concerto is one of three the participants can choose from (the other two are Shostakovich’s and Dutilleux’s).
I performed this Concerto with Slave quite often in England and the USA. But for me, the most memorable performance took place in La Rochelle, in the west of France, which hosted Rostropovich’s cello competition and a regular music festival. It so happened that one day the winner of the first prize, Louis Claret, performed my Concerto with a Lorraine orchestra, and the next day it was performed by Slave with the Halverson Dutch Radio Orchestra under my baton. Slave must have said to himself: ”Now I’ll show them how to play this concerto”.
He practiced perhaps half an hour, perhaps an hour, I don’t know, and he played as he had never played before. It was so infectious and I almost ”went into a trance” while conducting. The orchestra too played as if ”possessed”. The performance was phenomenal, never before and never since have I heard anything like that. It was one of the most beautiful moments of my life.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
1978
Krzysztof Zanussi’s film: Baird, Lutosławski, Penderecki .
12 April
Premiere of Les espaces du sommeil in Berlin with Fischer-Dieskau under the composer’s baton.The performance took place in 1978, because the piece had to wait for a while. When I sent him the score, he already had engagements for the next two years. The first performance took place almost three years after the work was completed […]. He is a man of extraordinary ease, perhaps I would even say, dangerous ease at times. Personally, I like people who work with some effort, because they perhaps reach a little bit deeper into the essence of the work. Although, I have to say that this recording is very beautiful. But one could see that, just like everything else, he mastered it with great ease and speed. This is impressive.
Lutosławski in conversation with Zofia Owińska.
1979
5 May
Lutosławski completes Novelette written for Rostropovich and the National Symphony Orchestra from Washington.July
Conducts concerts at the famous Proms Festival at the Royal Albert Hall (Les espaces du sommeil and Paroles tissees) preceded by a pre-concert talk.Indeed, there is less and less time and more and more work; yet, as you can see, this room contains evidence of how much I like painting. There is this beautiful abstract painting by Stażewski, which he gave me as a present and which accompanies me in my everyday work; there is also a beautiful colourful drawing by Barbara Zbrożyna. I also have two etchings by Vieira da Silva, which she personally gave to me. These are just a few paintings. Whenever I have time when I’m away, I visit galleries and museums. Unfortunately, this is increasingly rare.
As regards books - of course they accompany me every day; there always has to be time for them, but, as I've said, there's less and less of it.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Ewa Heine.)
- 1980–1994
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1980
3 January
Wigmore Hall - premiere of Epitaph for oboe and piano in memory of the composer Alan Richardson.July
Lutosławski conducts a masterclass at Aix-en-Provence (dedicated to his and Dutilleux’s works).24 July
Premiere of Double Concerto at the Lucerne Festival (under Paul Sacher’s baton).Epitaph is the first work that is based not on the twelve-note series but on something new to me, something I had been looking for, for a long time but hadn’t been able to find, but finally I did. I never talk about this little secret I discovered then, because it is something that should be put into words. And I don’t need that. I haven’t explained this to anybody. However it still applies; without this principle, I wouldn’t have been able to write all those works beginning with Epitaph.
All those works couldn’t have been composed, if it hadn’t been for this little invention of mine. It has turned out to be not so little after all.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Irina Nikolska.)
5 December
We are living in a rather uncomfortable and tense period. Sometimes I feel very tired by this state of constant uncertainty. Yet, despite that, I am working on the symphony.(Letter to Mario di Bonaventura.)
1981
30-31 January
Lutosławski takes part in an extraordinary assembly of the Composers’ UnionFebruary - March
Concert tour ending with a performance with the Berliner Philharmoniker.22 April
Premiere of Grave for cello and piano25 August
Concert at the PromsDecember
A session entitled ”Poetry, Music, Experience, Reflection” on Mieczysław Tomaszewski’s 60th birthday.11 December
Lutosławski delivers a speech on truth at the Congress of Polish Culture.After the introduction of martial law in Poland, Lutosławski withdraws from public life.
The congress has been organised by people of art and science. Let me begin, therefore, with a simple statement that the ultimate goal of art is beauty and the ultimate goal of science is truth. Yet, just as we can find a unique beauty in mathematics, astronomy, and undoubtedly in many other sciences, so in art we inevitably encounter the problem of truth.
Truth with regard to art is an equivocal notion. In his reflections, ”On different meanings of truthfulness in a work of art”, Roman Ingarden discusses a dozen or so meanings of the word.
At the moment, I'm interested in the one that refers to - as Ingarden says - the ”truthfulness” understood as faithfulness to the author's expression in his or her work. I mean here, in particular, the ethical aspect of the problem, that is, for instance: whether the authors, when creating their work, were following their artistic conscience; whether they acted according to the aesthetics they professed; whether they respected the artistic canons they believed in; meaning - whether they gave an honest testimony to their inner truth.
(From Lutosławski's address at the Congress of Culture 11 XII.)
1982
February
Concerts in London.Summer
Visit to Norway.August
Visit to Paris (composer of the summer).Autumn
Concerts in England and Hungary.Well, we all collaborated in the end -- didn't we? -- until the introduction of martial law […]. We were there during Gierek's times or even Gomółka's times, or even earlier [Gierek and Gomółka were secretaries of Polish communist party in the 1960s and 1970s ]. We all talked to ministers of culture and art, to officials; we would even be invited to the central party committee -- weren't we? -- to discuss Warsaw Autumn. Yes, it did happen. This was normal… a normal procedure. But after 1980 and 1981 this isn't possible anymore for me. It's like with a shoe that pinches: when you have taken it off, you can't put in on again; it's impossible […]. And that is why I don't want to follow this procedure anymore […], the one we had in the past. I've had enough of this official schizophrenia: when one says something different from what one thinks, and then one does something still different from what one says […]. I've had enough.
(In conversation with Stanisław Będkowski.)
1983
70th birthday feted abroad, quietly celebrated in Poland in accordance with the composer’s wishes.
Lutosławski receives the Ernst von Siemens Prize (Munich)
Honorary doctorate from Durham University.
January
Jubilee concert with the New York Philharmonic, Zubin Mehta and Roman Jabłoński.29 September
Symphony No. 3 premiered by Solti in Chicago.4 October
London Sinfonietta performs Chain 1 at the Queen Elisabeth Hall in London.I am not saying that my music is my private property, but as long as I live - I feel attached to it.
That is why those who want to listen to it should take into account whether I will be pleased or hurt by performances of my works. In my opinion, today is not a good moment for celebrating anything, including my jubilee.
(In conversation with Tadeusz Kaczyński.)
The slowly and gradually rising greatness of Witold Lutosławski’s music -- rising above the raging waves of time, indifferent to the omnipresent crisis of values - is comforting. It strengthens our faith in all those imponderabilia, which the everyday life seems to be denying. It assumes the status of a moral value. Therefore, perhaps the best thing we could do is indeed to bow our heads before it in respectful silence?
(Ludwik Erhardt writing in „Ruch Muzyczny”, 27 No. 2.)
1984
Lutosławski receives the Solidarity Prize for Symphony No. 3, an honour he will always cherish.
6 December
Honorary doctorate from the Jagiellonian University.The title I was given today is therefore a source of immense satisfaction to me.
I must, however, say that the situation I’ve found myself in is rather disconcerting. For I’m being rewarded for something for which I deserve only little credit. The value of musical works depends mainly on the value of the talent the composer has been endowed with. And talent is a privilege rather than merit. An artist has no right to consider it his or her property. It is a gift entrusted to the artist to be then transmitted to other people in the form of ready-made, performable works.
(Lutosławski, During the honorary doctorate award ceremony at the Jagiellonian University.)
1985
18 January
Partita for violin and piano premiered in Saint Paul by Pinchas Zukerman and Paul NeikrugLutosławski receives the Grawemeyer Award from the University of Louisville for Symphony no 3. He donates the money to charity and scholarships for young Polish musicians.
In 1985 it was a huge shock to me, because I had never before performed contemporary music. I couldn’t make myself interested in those kinds of works and that is why I lacked courage. Perhaps it was the other way round: lack of courage did not allow me to become interested in such music? Lutosławski was the first. When I got the score from Paul Sacher, it seemed to me a set of hieroglyphs. I felt flattered by the invitation to perform Chain 2, but I worried whether I would be able to understand this music, to bring something personal to it.
Not only perform it, but also to infuse it with life… The doubts soon left me. I realised that the composer demanded something from me and that this something was inside me, although I hadn't realised that before. Lutosławski touched a chord that hadn't sounded yet.
(Anne -Sophie Mutter in conversation with Stanisław Deja.)
1986
Lutosławski makes his first public statement after the introduction of martial law.
He becomes the first foreigner to receive the Queen Sofia Prize.
January
Premiere of Chain 2 at the Zurich Tonhalle with Anne-Sophie Mutter.26-30 March
Royal Academy of Music Festival in London presents most of Lutosławski’s works.He takes part in masterclasses organised by the Polish Society of Contemporary Music in Kazimierz.
10 December
Lutosławski composes Chain 3 for San Francisco Symphony Orchestra.The masterclasses give young composers an opportunity to learn many important and interesting things. They always provide them with an opportunity to present their own works, not only to their peers but also to an exceptionally competent group of experienced teacher-musicians.
As a result, the participants can hear both criticism and words of encouragement, which is often crucial in the life of an artist at the beginning of his or her career.
(Marta Ługowska in conversation with Lutosławski during masterclasses in Kazimierz.)
1987
More honorary doctorates - Cambridge, Baldwin, Belfast, Manchester.
Honorary membership of the Accademia di Santa Cecilia.
4 May
Concert at the Academy of Music in Warsaw - first performance after the martial law period.It's about a phenomenon, which has a decidedly negative impact on the future of musical culture. I mean here a kind of pollution of the environment […] in which we are destined to live, work, and rest. This environment - especially in wealthy countries - is systematically polluted by the omnipresent quasi-music […], usually it's an insipid sound pulp, which immediately throws a person sensitive to music into a state of misery and, after a while, profoundly irritates.
(Statement for ”Res Publica”, 1987 No. 1)
1988
Grammy Award and honorary doctorate from the Academy of Music in Warsaw.
19 August
Zimerman performs Piano Concerto at the Salzburg Festival.September
First performance after the martial law period at the Warsaw Autumn Festival.11 September
Statement on trade union pluralism issued by the Lech Wałęsa committee and signed by Lutosławski.You see, we are all living in a situation in which no one can avoid the question of how to live. But I’m not competent to give people recipes for life; I wouldn’t be able to answer such questions at all. How to behave today in situations we encounter almost every day; I know that more or less and if my behaviour can be useful to anybody, then I’m very happy, this is an honour to me.
But I can't see what more I could do to tell people how to behave decently; I don't feel I have been designated to carry out some special mission in this respect.
(Lutosławski in conversation with Grzegorz Michalski.)
1989
Lutosławski composes Interlude as a link between Partita and Chain 2 (performed in 1990).
1 April
Lutosławski takes part in the Independent Culture Forum at the Warsaw University. It is a meeting of artists and intellectuals organised by the Lech Wałęsa Civic Committee.When I compose, I always imagine living music. Such was the music of my childhood, my youth. And that is why music listened to in the concert hall is so important to me.
(Witold Lutosławski in Conversation with Krzysztof Zanussi, BBC 1989.)
1990
Lutosławski receives the Signature Award of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and an honorary doctorate from the University of Pittsburgh.
8 June
Meeting with John Paul II at Warsaw’s Teatr Wielki [Grand Theatre]8 August
Premiere of Chantefleurs et Chantefables at the Proms Festival in London.And finally […] I remembered those poems Desnos had written for children, and I completely changed my decision and decided to write a cycle. Simply because I didn’t have a text that would fit into what I wanted initially. They are short, very charming poems, sometimes funny, sometimes delicately lyrical, very beautiful; I put together nine of those in order to compose a cycle for soprano and small orchestra. As regards the Norwegian singer Solveig Kringleborn, I heard her when the work had already been written.
I simply thought that she could be a good performer of the work. I’m very happy that she has agreed, and has even has become quite keen on the project, because she immediately accepted an invitation from the Warsaw Autumn Festival to repeat it at the final concert.
(Interview for the II Programme of the Polish Radio.)
1991
Lutosławski receives the Signature Award of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and an honorary doctorate from the University of Pittsburgh.
8 June
Meeting with John Paul II at Warsaw’s Teatr Wielki [Grand Theatre]8 August
Premiere of Chantefleurs et Chantefables at the Proms Festival in London.And finally […] I remembered those poems Desnos had written for children, and I completely changed my decision and decided to write a cycle. Simply because I didn’t have a text that would fit into what I wanted initially. They are short, very charming poems, sometimes funny, sometimes delicately lyrical, very beautiful; I put together nine of those in order to compose a cycle for soprano and small orchestra. As regards the Norwegian singer Solveig Kringleborn, I heard her when the work had already been written. I simply thought that she could be a good performer of the work. I’m very happy that she has agreed, and has even has become quite keen on the project, because she immediately accepted an invitation from the Warsaw Autumn Festival to repeat it at the final concert.
(From an interview with Elżbieta Markowska, 1991)
1992
April
2nd Lutosławski Composers’ Competition22 August
Lutosławski completes Symphony No. 4October
Member of Lech Wałęsa’s presidential Culture Committee.Today no one blames Brahms for not being a very avant-garde composer in his day, though we still discover in his works solutions his contemporaries never dreamed of. Eventually, we have to arrive at a situation in which music will not be only a show of novelties, a show of how to make it, but will be first of all an important message from its author. And only then will we have conditions in which some classics can be created; but it will still be years before we achieve that. Although there are signs that this is already happening, because the so-called avant-garde has lost its significance, its edge. I would even venture to state, that this avant-garde has become terribly old-fashioned.
(In conversation with Mieczysław Kominek.)
1993
5 February
Premiere of Lutosławski’s Symphony No.4 in Los Angeles18 May
The Swedish Academy of Music awards the Polar Prize to Lutosławski. The award is considered the equivalent to a Musical Nobel.23 May
Polish premiere of Symphony No. 425 September
Last concert at the Warsaw Autumn Festival.7-8 October
A Lutosławski competition is launched in Białystok on Stanisław Olędzki’s initiative.24 October
Last concert conducted by Lutosławski (in Toronto).November
Lutosławski receives the Kyoto Prize.December
An initially innocent looking disease turns out to be a malignant neoplasm (melanoma).In the preface to his novel The Nigger of the ”Narcissus” the great English writer, Joseph Conrad -- who, by the way, was Polish -- wrote about the ”the magic suggestiveness of music - which is the art of arts”.
In this context, the decision of the Polar Music Prize founder -- to award it also to the so-called ”serious” composers -- deserves the highest praise.
(Witold Lutosławski's speech after receiving the musical Nobel - the Polar Music Prize.)
1994
Classical Music Award for Symphony No.4
19 January
Lutosławski receives the Order of the White Eagle.7 February
Lutosławski dies in the Government Hospital on Emilia Plater Street.16 February
Funeral at the Powązkowski cemetery.22 April
Death of Danuta Lutosławska.These works are a message from an ideal world, which is the world of our dreams, desires, or notions of an ideal world. It is a message from someone who exists in a different world, to which others have no direct access. Yet, there is indirect access through works of art.
And this is a role for a creative artist, this and not participation in politics or various areas of public life.
(In conversation with Ludwika Malewska-Mostowicz.)