Vladimir Padwa (February 8, 1900 – April 28, 1981) was an American

pianist A pianist ( , ) is an individual musician who plays the piano. Since most forms of Western music can make use of the piano, pianists have a wide repertoire and a wide variety of styles to choose from, among them traditional classical music, ja ...

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and Defi ...

, and

educator A teacher, also called a schoolteacher or formally an educator, is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence, or virtue, via the practice of teaching. ''Informally'' the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. whe ...

Biography

He was born in Kryviakino, Russian Empire, the son of Mikhail and Maria (Schneidmann) Padwa. He was raised in

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

, then a territory of

Imperial Russia The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the List of Russian monarchs, Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended th ...

, receiving Estonian citizenship in 1917 when Estonia became an independent country. He married Alexandra Niedas of Tallinn in 1927. The couple resided in London and Berlin before coming to the United States in 1932. Their daughter Tatiana was born in 1933. The family settled in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

and later lived in

Woodstock, New York Woodstock is a town in Ulster County, New York, United States, in the northern part of the county, northwest of Kingston, NY. It lies within the borders of the Catskill Park. The population was 5,884 at the 2010 census, down from 6,241 in 2000 ...

from 1935 to 1946. Padwa and Alexandra divorced in 1946, and he married Natalie Joy Lozier on 18 December 1947 in Stamford, Connecticut. Their son Thomas was born in 1953. Padwa became a

U.S. citizen Citizenship of the United States is a legal status that entails Americans with specific rights, duties, protections, and benefits in the United States. It serves as a foundation of fundamental rights derived from and protected by the Constituti ...

in 1948, and from that year made his home in New York City.

Career

He was educated at the Conservatories of

St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...

and

Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as wel ...

, receiving the

Matura or its translated terms (''Mature'', ''Matur'', , , , , , ) is a Latin name for the secondary school exit exam or "maturity diploma" in various European countries, including Albania, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech ...

degree from Leipzig in 1924. At the age of 17, he was also co-founder in 1917 of the State Conservatory of Music in

Tallinn Tallinn () is the most populous and capital city of Estonia. Situated on a bay in north Estonia, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland of the Baltic Sea, Tallinn has a population of 437,811 (as of 2022) and administratively lies in the Harju ' ...

. He was the last pupil of

Ferruccio Busoni Ferruccio Busoni (1 April 1866 – 27 July 1924) was an Italian composer, pianist, conductor, editor, writer, and teacher. His international career and reputation led him to work closely with many of the leading musicians, artists and literary ...

in Berlin and then studied with Busoni’s master pupil Michael Zadora. He gave concerts throughout Europe, and in collaboration with the Neo-Bechstein company, he was director of and a performer in the first broadcast of all-electronic music from Berlin, in 1932. Padwa’s collaboration with Bechstein resulted in 1932 in a six-month contract with Radio-Keith Orpheum (RKO) and the Radio City Theaters to perform in America on the Bechstein

electric piano An electric piano is a musical instrument which produces sounds when a performer presses the keys of a piano-style musical keyboard. Pressing keys causes mechanical hammers to strike metal strings, metal reeds or wire tines, leading to vibrations ...

as part of the Inaugural Roxy

radio broadcast Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radio ...

from

Radio City Music Hall Radio City Music Hall is an entertainment venue and Theater (structure), theater at 1260 Sixth Avenue (Manhattan), Avenue of the Americas, within Rockefeller Center, in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. Nicknamed "The Showplac ...

in New York City on November 13, 1932. Before ending his contract in 1933, he performed regularly in radio broadcasts and gave the first live solo piano broadcast of

electronic music Electronic music is a genre of music that employs electronic musical instruments, digital instruments, or circuitry-based music technology in its creation. It includes both music made using electronic and electromechanical means ( electroac ...

in the U.S. His concert career included a seven-year association as accompanist to violinist

Mischa Elman Mischa (Mikhail Saulovich) Elman (russian: Михаил Саулович Эльман; January 20, 1891April 5, 1967) was a Russian-born American violinist famed for his passionate style, beautiful tone, and impeccable artistry and musicality. E ...

, with whom he made four successful world tours to five continents from 1934 to 1940. In the 1930s and 1940s Padwa also participated in the Maverick Concert Hall music series in Woodstock, New York. In 1940 he was

musical director A music(al) director or director of music is the person responsible for the musical aspects of a performance, production, or organization. This would include the artistic director and usually chief conductor of an orchestra or concert band, the ...

of the

Woodstock Playhouse The Woodstock Playhouse is an American summer stock theater located at 103 Mill Hill Road in Woodstock, New York Woodstock is a town in Ulster County, New York, United States, in the northern part of the county, northwest of Kingston, NY. ...

Concerts. In 1941, along with pianists Adam Garner, Frank Mittler, and Edward Edson, he founded the nationally acclaimed

First Piano Quartet The First Piano Quartet was a quartet of pianists first organized in the United States in 1941. Its founding members were Vladimir Padwa, George Robert, Adam Garner, and Henry Holt. The quartet was originally conceived of as a radio group, with ...

. The FPQ was heard regularly on radio and recorded for

RCA Victor RCA Records is an American record label currently owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America. It is one of Sony Music's four flagship labels, alongside RCA's former long-time rival Columbia Records; also Aris ...

. He became professor of music at the

New York College of Music The New York College of Music was an American conservatory of music located in Manhattan that flourished from 1878 to 1968. The college was incorporated under the laws of New York and was empowered to confer diplomas and degrees ranging from a Bac ...

in 1948, and was named chairman of the piano department in 1967; In 1968, the College of Music merged with

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...

, where he became Associate Professor of Music Education. After 1948 he spent his summers composing at the Vermont Toy Farm in

Essex Junction, Vermont Essex Junction is a city in Chittenden County, Vermont, United States. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the population was 10,590. It was incorporated as a village on November 15, 1892. Essex Junction became Vermont’s 10th city on July 1, 2022. Am ...

. In 1958 he was made an honorary member of the Accademia Internazionale Di Roma. During the 1960s and 1970s he was an adjudicator for the New Brunswick Competitive Festival of Music and Quebec Music Festivals, for whom he was commissioned to write piano pieces to be used in

sight reading In music, sight-reading, also called ''a prima vista'' (Italian meaning "at first sight"), is the practice of reading and performing of a piece in a music notation that the performer has not seen or learned before. Sight-singing is used to descri ...

competitions.

Thiel College Thiel College (, ) is a private college in Greenville, Pennsylvania. It is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and is one of the smallest colleges or universities in the region with about 100 full-time and part time faculty ...

awarded him an

honorary doctorate An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or ''ad hon ...

in music in 1978. He composed music for a wide range of instruments and was a member of the

American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers The American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) () is an American not-for-profit performance-rights organization (PRO) that collectively licenses the public performance rights of its members' musical works to venues, broadca ...

, from which he received the Standard Panel Awards annually from 1968-1980. Professor Padwa maintained a full teaching and performing schedule to the end of his life. A collection of his music and papers is maintained at the music library of the

Peabody Institute The Peabody Institute of The Johns Hopkins University is a private conservatory and preparatory school in Baltimore, Maryland. It was founded in 1857 and opened in 1866 by merchant/financier and philanthropist George Peabody (1795–1869) ...

of the

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hem ...

Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...

, in the U.S.A.The New York Times, May 1, 1981.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Padwa, Vladimir 1900 births 1981 deaths Jewish American classical composers American classical pianists Male classical pianists American male pianists Estonian emigrants to the United States Estonian people of Russian descent American people of Russian-Jewish descent American people of Estonian-Jewish descent New York College of Music faculty New York University faculty Estonian Jews Russian Jews 20th-century classical composers 20th-century classical pianists American male classical composers American classical composers 20th-century American pianists 20th-century American composers 20th-century American male musicians 20th-century American Jews