1869–1928 · Poland
Henryk Melcer-Szczawiński (1869–1928) was a Polish musician: a pianist, composer, conductor and teacher. He studied in Warsaw, improved his playing under Theodor Leschetizky in Vienna and won a composers' competition in Berlin. Later he headed the Warsaw Conservatory. Audiences admired his large Chopin programmes. His pupils included Mieczysław Horszowski and Alexandre Tansman. The site has his piece "Moniuszko Fileuse".
Henryk was born in 1869. His father, Karol Melcer, was a violinist who ran the Kalisz Music Society; his mother was Zofia Bronisława, born Bochenek. He gained the second half of his surname, Szczawiński, through adoption by Jakobina Grzybowska, née Szczawińska, which gave him a Polish-sounding name.
The boy began learning the piano with his grandmother, Józefa Klemczyńska-Melcer, and with his father. He first appeared before an audience together with his father on 25 September 1877. In 1887 Henryk finished the classical boys' gymnasium in Kalisz with a gold medal and went to Warsaw, where he began studying mathematics at the Imperial University.
In Warsaw he studied music too. In 1888–1891 in Warsaw, Melcer-Szczawiński took piano lessons with Rudolf Strobl and composition lessons with Zygmunt Noskowski. He received his piano diploma in 1891. He also graduated from the university, as a mathematician.
From 1889 to 1892 he performed as a soloist and accompanist in many Polish towns. In 1890 he toured Russia with the American singer Ludwika N. Nicholson. He gave his first concert of his own in Warsaw on 27 March 1892. Then, in 1892–1894, he improved his skills in Vienna under Theodor Leschetizky.
In 1895 the Anton Rubinstein competition took place in Berlin. Melcer-Szczawiński won first prize there as a composer, for his First Piano Concerto, a piano trio and two pieces from the set of Trois morceaux caractéristiques, Op. 5. In the pianists' contest he won third prize. In Berlin he met Alexander Scriabin and Ferruccio Busoni.
He taught at the conservatories of Helsingfors and Lviv. In Lviv in 1896–1899 his pupils included the six-year-old Mieczysław Horszowski. In 1898 Melcer-Szczawiński won first prize at the Paderewski composers' competition in Leipzig for his Second Piano Concerto. In 1899 he won the contest for the post of director of the Galician Music Society and its conservatory, but to avoid conflict with the composers of Lviv he withdrew and left the city.
From 1899 he headed the Music Society in Łódź. There he gathered and trained a choir and an amateur orchestra, with which he performed Haydn's Seasons. In 1904, at a composers' competition announced by the Warsaw Philharmonic, he won second prize for his opera Maria. From October 1903 he was a professor of the advanced piano course at the Vienna conservatory, where he worked until 1906, and he kept travelling every month to Łódź and Lviv to see his pupils.
In the autumn of 1907 Melcer-Szczawiński settled in Warsaw. From 2 October 1908 he was artistic director of the Warsaw Philharmonic. Trying to raise the standard of the orchestra, he engaged Fitelberg for twelve concerts and changed the repertoire policy: he promoted the music of Karłowicz and the symphonic works of Schumann, Bruckner and Elgar. In March 1909 he gave up the directorship but stayed at the Philharmonic as head of the chamber and oratorio evenings.
In 1909–1911 he led the Philharmonic choir. Under his direction in 1910 the choir sang Franck's Les Béatitudes, in 1911 Mozart's Requiem and Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, and in 1912 he conducted the first performance of Nowowiejski's Quo vadis. In the summers of 1910 and 1912 he conducted symphony concerts in the Szwajcarska Valley in Warsaw. Every year he gave evenings of chamber music at the Philharmonic.
In the years before the First World War, with no permanent post, he concentrated mainly on the piano. Audiences admired his large Chopin programmes, for example in Warsaw in 1912 and 1913. He also played in Petersburg, Berlin, Kyiv and in the Crimea. From October 1915 to March 1916 he was artistic director of the opera in Warsaw, and he left over a dispute about repertoire: he objected to staging German operas in a city occupied by German troops. In 1916 he played all of Beethoven's sonatas in Warsaw, explaining the form of each, and this mixing of concert and lecture was something new for the city.
At the end of 1917 Melcer-Szczawiński took over the piano class at the Warsaw conservatory that Aleksander Michałowski had taught before him. From 1922 he was director of the conservatory, and in 1925 he also took the composition class of Statkowski. He introduced new curricula, changed the examinations, set up a school choir and orchestra, and revived the school's concert life and the work of the opera classes. He set high artistic demands for pupils and teachers alike and tried to win Szymanowski for the school.
His pupils over the years included Selim Palmgren, Mieczysław Horszowski and Alexandre Tansman, as well as the composer and pianist Jadwiga Sarnecka. He was busy with public affairs too. From 1917 he was the first president of the Polish Artistic Club and led it for many years, where he organised concerts, especially of contemporary music. From 1921 he headed the Union of Polish Musicians' Associations, and in 1921 he took part in organising the first congress of musicians of independent Poland.
Melcer-Szczawiński's service was recognised with a state honour: on 2 May 1923 he received the Officer's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta for his artistic work in music. On 16 December 1925 the Warsaw Philharmonic marked thirty years of his artistic career, and in 1927 he sat on the jury of the first International Chopin Piano Competition.
Because of heart disease he performed and conducted less and less often. The last concert of his compositions was conducted by Wiłkomirski at the Warsaw Philharmonic on 22 January 1928. In April 1928 Melcer-Szczawiński died suddenly of a heart attack during a lesson at the conservatory. He left his wife Helena, née Szczawińska, and two daughters, Wanda and Maria.
The composer is buried in Warsaw, at the Powązki Cemetery.
Melcer-Szczawiński wrote for orchestra, the stage, chamber groups and the piano. His works include a symphony, two piano concertos, a piano trio and a violin sonata. The Piano Trio in G minor was probably written in 1892–1894, and the Canon for violin, cello and piano is dated 1890.
For the stage he composed the opera Maria (1904) and music for Wyspiański's tragedy Protesilaus and Laodamia (1902). In 1904 the opera won second prize at a competition of the Warsaw Philharmonic. He began work on the stage piece Protesilaus and Laodamia around 1900 and was still working on it in early 1916.
His piano works include Trois morceaux caractéristiques, Op. 5, and variations on a Polish folk theme. In 1903 in Vienna the composer performed his variations on a theme by Moniuszko, "Le cosaque". He won the Berlin competition of 1895 with works that included two pieces from Op. 5.
Melcer-Szczawiński worked as a conductor too. He made his debut in that role in Lviv, at the Philharmonic, in October 1902. Later he led symphony concerts and the choir of the Warsaw Philharmonic. His programmes included works by Karłowicz and the symphonic music of Schumann, Bruckner and Elgar, authors then less known in Poland.
As a performer he appeared in many cities. From January 1895 he travelled with concerts to Berlin, Kyiv, Kraków, Lviv and Paris. In 1901 he played in Warsaw, Kraków, Berlin, Leipzig, Dresden, Vienna and Budapest, and later in Prague and Geneva.
He also had composing successes at competitions: in Berlin in 1895, in Leipzig in 1898 and at the Warsaw Philharmonic's competition in 1904 he won prizes for his works. In Leipzig the prize came for his Second Piano Concerto, and in Berlin for his First Concerto, a piano trio and two pieces from Op. 5. In Berlin he also won third prize as a pianist.
As a pianist he drew admiration with his large Chopin programmes, and in 1916 he played all of Beethoven's sonatas in Warsaw. In 1924 the Minister of Military Affairs approved a march based on his composition under the title "March for the Generals". For those who want to get to know his music, the site offers the piece "Moniuszko Fileuse" (level "Intermediate+"), which is so far the only piece of his in the catalogue.