PADEREWSKI FESTIVAL IN PASO ROBLES
Credit: polmusic.org & newtimesslo.com
Ignacy Jan Paderewski (1860-1941) was the quintessential multitasker with a Midas touch. He traveled the world as concert pianist, composed an interesting variety of works largely for piano which included that famous Minuet in G, taught Witold Malcuzynski (one of the great Chopin interpreters), generously supported musicians and artists in need, spoke seven languages fluently – and there is more. He was the first to perform as soloist at Carnegie Hall, was featured in the 1937 film Moonlight Sonata, became Prime Minister of Poland, served as diplomat and advisor on Polish issues internationally - and became a vintner.
Paderewski’s remarkable career is revisited in a Q and A section below by Marek Zebrowski, Artistic Director of the Paderewski Festival in Paso Robles and Director of University of Southern California’s Polish Music Center (PMC). He is a respected concert pianist and composer, has taught at universities such as MIT and UCLA and is Editor-in-Chief of the Polish Music History Series. In fact, PMC’s treasure trove includes the Paderewski Archives. Pandemic permitting, the center plans to collaborate with Oregon Music Festival and Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra later this year in a concert that will include the world premiere of works by Polish composers Wojciech Błażejczyk and Pawel Mykietyn.
In 1914 Paderewski purchased a spread of land in the Paso Robles area of California’s Central Coast known for its distinctive terroir, planted fruit trees and Zinfandel and Petit Syrah varietals which were processed by former York Mountain Winery now Epoch Estate Wines. In fact, their sites in Templeton include the Paderewski Vineyard. Paso Robles is also home to Firestone Walker Brewing Company of which a limited edition Paderewski Pils beer was produced for the 2015 Festival with the namesake’s image on the label. Na Zdrowie.
For many years Paderewski cherished visiting his Rancho San Ignacio and became totally immersed in the area’s viticulture and mineral baths. As a gesture of gratitude, the Paderewski Festival was founded in 1993 to honor its namesake artist and also promote Polish culture and music. A dedicated list of sponsors include top quality local wineries such as Epoch, Cass, Tablas Creek and Derby, University of Southern California’s Polish Music Center, Consul General of the Republic of Poland in Los Angeles and LOT Polish Airlines
The Festival was postponed last year because of the pandemic and although virtual performances were offered, the event looks forward to a November restart (usually around Paderewski’s birthdate) in locations that include Cuesta College and the Ballroom of historic Paso Robles Inn. Signature offerings highlight performances and master classes by top-notch pianists or violinists and a Youth Piano Competition consisting of Junior and Senior Divisions of which the talented winners perform at the Paderewski Festival and also participate in a Youth Cultural Exchange Program in Tarnów and Kraków, Poland.
Paso Robles and Tarnów, Poland are Sister Cities so this enriching program allows Festival competition winners to perform in master classes, recitals and music festivals at venues such as the Paderewski Centre at Kąśna Dolna, Paderewski’s former manor near Tarnów and Jagiellonian University in Kraków. In alternating years the Festival hosts gifted students from Kraków and the Podolia region of Ukraine, Paderewski’s birthplace who come to Paso Robles to study and play. The Paderewski Festival in Paso Robles offers a truly rewarding exchange and sharing of cultural trends and traditions.
Marek Zebrowski shares thoughts about Paderewski and Polish music in conversation with Editor Leonne Lewis.
What qualities made Paderewski so unique and respected?
Ignacy Jan Paderewski is a rare example of a great artist and great patriot who was so devoted to restoring Poland’s independence after over a century-long period of partitions that he did not hesitate to set aside a spectacularly successful musical career for a rather uncertain career in politics. Those close to him like his goddaughter Anne Strakacz-Appleton, who was a dear friend remembered well Paderewski’s sterling qualities as a human being: honesty, tact, exceptional erudition and great willingness to help as many individuals as possible – in fact almost anyone who turned to him for assistance. Good humor and a love of great cuisine with late-starting, long-lasting suppers accompanied by lots of good wine and sweet champagne were also among the very attractive traits of Paderewski’s personality.
He was very fond of late-night bridge games, was an excellent snooker player as a large billiard table was one central feature in the main hallway of his Swiss residence and never missed a round of golf whenever he came to Paso Robles for some R&R during American concert tours. Curiosity about people and places was a constant preoccupation of Paderewski. In his private rail car there was a map of the US where places he visited were marked with pins. He would research the statistics about the regions, cities and college campuses he saw as either an artist or tourist. His demeanor and probing conversations with many great historical figures made great and lasting impressions, a fact testified to by such individuals as George Clemenceau, Robert Lansing, FDR, Herbert Hoover, various royals from Queen Victoria onwards, popes and emperors just to name a few.
Paderewski offered artistic and financial support to musicians and composers of his time. What is the role of the Polish Music Center at the University of Southern California?
The Polish Music Center’s promotion of Polish music takes various forms – concerts, lectures, publications including a book series and online newsletter – all of them seeking to encourage interest in Polish musical culture among performers and audiences worldwide. Fortunately this task is not too onerous since there is a great deal of superb music written by Polish composers, especially since the end of World War II. The stylistic variety and fresh musical ideas first presented by the Polish avant-garde in the late 1950’s at the Warszawska jesień festivals took the world by storm making these names instantly recognizable around the globe: Wojciech Kilar, Zygmunt Krauze, Witold Lutoslawski, Andrzej Panufnik, Krzysztof Penderecki, Henryk Mikołaj Górecki and Bogusław Schaeffer.
Since that time generations of younger composers beginning with Joanna Bruzdowicz, Krzysztof Meyer, Marta Ptaszyńska and Elżbieta Sikora, all born in 1943, continued to forge new stylistic and expressive paths in Polish music. Next came Krzesimir Dębski, Hanna Kulenty, Piotr Moss and Pavel Szymański, born between 1949 and 1961, each of them represents different musical aesthetic. The ensuing generation of prominent and gifted Polish composers, mostly born in the 1970’s include Pawel Mykietyn, Ewa Trębacz, Krzysztof Wołck and Agata Zubel whose music is widely performed on stages all across the world.
Polish music seems to incorporate a sense of national identity. What makes it uniquely Polish in nature?
Paderewski’s compositions be it for solo piano, concertos, orchestra or stage works follow the path clearly laid out earlier by Chopin. In describing Chopin’s Polonaises his contemporary and friend Robert Schumann referred to them as “cannons hidden among the roses.” Schumann’s bon mot deftly captured the noble passion of a traditional and stately Polish dance that in Chopin’s reinterpretation also contained a message that went well beyond art and music in addressing the Polish national identity during the time of partitions. As a result, referring to Poland’s history, tradition and music became a requirement for every composer after Chopin. When Paderewski began his career as a young pianist and budding composer in the 1880’s he was clearly seen by his audiences as a Chopin disciple. He wrote a lot of short piano pieces based on Polish folk dances, the mazurka and Krakówiak as well as a Polonaise and Nocturne using genres that were extensively practiced by Chopin. There is also Paderewski’s Fantasy on Polish Themes for Piano and Orchestra, Op. 19, the opera Manru and his longest and perhaps most ambitious work the “Polonia” Symphony, Op. 24.
Paderewski clearly understood that through music his compatriots are able to express their national identity. In 1910, Paderewski spoke these words to crowds at a celebration of Chopin’s centenary in Lwów.
Everything was forbidden to us. The language of our fathers, the faith of our forefathers, the worship of holy events from our past, our costumes, customs and our nation’s songs…They forbade us Słowacki, Krasiński, Mickiewicz but they did not forbid us Chopin. And in Chopin we have everything that was forbidden: colorful robes, gold-studded belt buckles, sober grey long-coats, festive Cracovian hats, the din of nobles’ swords, the gleam of peasants’ scythes, the groans of the wounded hearts, the revolts of caged spirits, cemetery crosses, wayside chapels, prayers of worried hearts, pains of imprisonment, longing for freedom, cursing of tyrants and joyous songs of liberty. For many years of suffering, torture and discrimination, for many years the threads of our forbidden and most sacred thoughts reached out to him and our pain-filled hearts sought his comfort. And lo, how many he had comforted and fortified…and maybe even converted. For it was he, the smuggler who in the rolled up scores of innocent notes delivered this forbidden Poland to his compatriots scattered in the far provinces; for it again was he the chaplain who supplied us the holy sacraments of our Homeland.
How has your vision for the Polish Music Center evolved?
Being a director of any entity invariably involves constantly adjusting various priorities, frequently reshaping programs and visions and always learning from experience as well as benefiting from the advice of others – co-workers, boards, well-wishers and the general public. Becoming the PMC Director in 2004 I wanted to continue the mission of its founder Wanda Wilk to promote Polish music among non-Polish audiences around the world. In 2001, Wilk’s successor Dr. Maja Trochimczyk initiated the annual series of Paderewski Lecture-Recitals that showcased contemporary Polish composers in person and their music to Southern California audiences. I’m proud to say that building on that idea, every year since 2004 we invited a number of world-class composers to present their compositions in concerts at the University of Southern California. Besides being a library, research center, concert and festival organizer and publisher the PMC also serves as an important repository for materials and legacies related to music making in Polish communities abroad including unprecedented collections related to Henryk Wars, known as Henry Wars in the US, Bronisław Kaper, Zygmunt Stojowski and Roman Ryterband.
Regarding the Paderewski Festival, 2003 was a difficult time for the Central Coast community that had just suffered a devastating earthquake in December, 2003. My mission was to find new concert venues, engage local sponsors and create a working Festival Board that would coordinate bringing the Festival back. We gradually expanded to a long weekend menu of offerings that eventually included concerts, lectures, film screenings, dance performances, Cultural Exchange Program with young pianist’s future in mind, concerts of young performers selected at the Youth Piano Competition, master classes and exhibits of Paderewski memorabilia at local libraries and museums. All of these events were of course accompanied by wine tastings and vineyard tours organized by our enthusiastic sponsors and supporters. Looking forward to 2021, we hope the Paderewski Festival will take place in person in Paso Robles however, being realistic about the future we are also ready to use our experience from last year to produce another series of online events worthy of our Festival patron’s name.
Could you comment on the importance of the Paderewski-California connection? This answer was provided by Krysta Close, Assistant Director of the Polish Music Center at the University of Southern California.
While Paderewski was truly a citizen of the world who performed on every continent and moved within the political circles of the highest international seats of power, he always considered himself a Pole at heart. However, he also cherished California as his second home. Whenever he toured the US he always spent a significant portion of that tour checking on the lands he has amassed on the Central Coast – his Rancho San Ignacio and Rancho Santa Helena, named for his wife – and resting at his beloved El Paso de Robles Hotel. His contributions to the region were not merely celebrity lip service. His investments into his vineyards, which involved extensive research into the proper viticulture and the wines they produced helped transform the Paso Robles region from small outcroppings of family farms to the booming, award-winning wine country it is today.
Viticulture was not the only impact Paderewski hoped to have on the Central Coast of California. He wrote of wanting to start a music school in Paso Robles and this dream is one we continue to foster with the Paderewski Festival. Paderewski is not the only important Polish composer in PMC’s collection with ties to California. In fact, the extensive collections of unique archival material is centered around composers who lived in or spent significant time in the Golden State. These include Henryk Wars AKA Henry Vars, who was one of Poland’s most popular composers of film music and popular songs before WW II. When Wars and his family took refuge in Los Angeles he started working for Hollywood studios but also wrote several large orchestral works inspired by the rhythm of his new home. In addition to the Wars Collection we were also given rare film scores by Bronisław Kaper who was the first Pole to win an Oscar for film music. {Kaper’s credits include an Academy Award for Best Original Score for Lili, 1953 and music for Mutiny on the Bounty, 1962}. The PMC also has an extensive collection of materials and recordings of Roman Ryterband, one of the only members of his family to have survived the Holocaust. Through our scholarship and promotion his works have gained interest and recognition not only in Poland but throughout the world. A manuscript by Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos highlights the truly international nature of our collection. The PMC has become not only a cultural repository but also a touchstone for a nation that has had a significant portion of its population living in diaspora for centuries.