Home > Baker's Student Encyclopedia of Music > Landowska, Wanda

(Alexandra), celebrated Polish-born French harpsichordist, pianist, and pedagogue.; b. Warsaw, July 5, 1879; d. Lakeville, Conn., Aug. 16, 1959. She studied PIANO at the Warsaw Conservatory and in Berlin with the well-known Polish-born pianist MORITZ MOSZKOWSKI.

In 1900 Landowska went to Paris, where she married Henry Lew, a writer. She traveled widely in Europe as a pianist, and as a harpsichordist from 1903. Subsequently, she devoted her efforts principally to reviving the art of HARPSICHORD playing. In 1912 she commissioned the Pleyel firm of Paris to construct a harpsichord for her. This was the first of the many keyboard instruments built for her in subsequent years. In 1913 she was invited to give a special harpsichord course at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik.

The outbreak of World War I in 1914 found Landowska in Germany, where she was interned until the war ended. In 1918 her husband was killed in an automobile accident in Berlin. In 1919 she gave master classes in harpsichord at the Basel Conservatory, then returned to Paris. In 1925 she bought a villa in St.-Leu-la-Forêt, near Paris, and established there a school for the study of early music. A concert hall was built there in 1927, where she presented regular concerts of early music and gave lessons on the subject. She also assembled a large collection of harpsichords. Her school attracted students from all over the world.

Landowska also commissioned new music for the harpsichord. MANUEL DE FALLA wrote for her a chamber concerto for harpsichord. She played the solo part in its first performance in Barcelona in 1926. Another commission was FRANCIS POULENC'S Concert champêtre for harpsichord and small orchestra in 1929. She appeared for the first time in America as soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra, under LEOPOLD STOKOWSKI, in 1923.

When the Germans invaded France in 1940, Landowska fled to Switzerland, abandoning her villa, library, and instruments. In 1941 she reached N.Y. She presented a concert of harpsichord music there in 1942, and then devoted herself mainly to teaching and making recordings. She settled in Lakeville, Connecticut, where she died in 1959.

Landowska was one of the greatest harpsichord performers. Her interpretations of BAROQUE music were notable in their balance between CLASSICAL precision and freedom from rigidity, particularly in the treatment of ORNAMENTATION. Landowska also wrote several books on music and composed CADENZAS for WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART'S concertos.