Paul de Schlözer or Paweł Schlözer (1841 or 18421 July 1898) was a Polish pianist and teacher of German descent. He was possibly also a composer, but the only two works attributed to him may have been written by Polish composer Moritz Moszkowski.

Life

Very little is known about his life. He became the piano accompanist to

Pablo de Sarasate Pablo Martín Melitón de Sarasate y Navascués (; 10 March 1844 – 20 September 1908), commonly known as Pablo de Sarasate, was a Spanish violinist, composer and Conducting, conductor of the Romantic music, Romantic period. His best known work ...

and to his own brother, the violinist Teodor (Fyodor) de Schlözer. In 1879 he taught at the Institute of Music in Warsaw, where he succeeded Juliusz Janotha.

Ignacy Jan Paderewski Ignacy Jan Paderewski (;

r 1859 R, or r, is the eighteenth letter of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''ar'' (pronounced ), plural ''ars''. The lette ...

– 29 June 1941) was a Polish pianist, composer and statesman who was a spokesman for Polish independence. In 1919, he was the nation's Prime Minister of Poland, prime minister and foreign minister durin ...

mentions him in his letters, sometimes by disparaging references such as "Mr. Paul" and "Pablito". Around 1892 he became a professor at the

Moscow Conservatory The Moscow Conservatory, also officially Tchaikovsky Moscow State Conservatory () is a higher musical educational institution located in Moscow, Russia. It grants undergraduate and graduate degrees in musical performance and musical research. Th ...

, where his most important pupil was the music historian

Leonid Sabaneyev Leonid Leonidovich Sabaneyev or Sabaneyeff or Sabaneev () (3 May 1968) was a Russian musicologist, music critic, composer and scientist. He was the son of Leonid Pavlovich Sabaneyev, a famous hunting expert, and his brother Boris was also a music ...

. On 3 February 1894, he performed the Chopin

Cello Sonata A cello sonata is piece written sonata form, often with the instrumentation of a cello taking solo role with piano accompaniment. Some of the earliest cello sonatas were composed in the 18th century by Francesco Geminiani and Antonio Vivaldi, and ...

with the visiting Czech cellist

Hanuš Wihan Hanuš Wihan (5 June 1855 – 1 May 1920) was a Czech cellist. Some considered him the greatest of his time. He was strongly associated with the works of Antonín Dvořák, whose Cello Concerto in B minor, Rondo in G minor, and the short pie ...

, at the Conservatory. His niece Tatiana Fyodorovna Schlözer became

Alexander Scriabin Alexander Nikolayevich Scriabin, scientific transliteration: ''Aleksandr Nikolaevič Skrjabin''; also transliterated variously as Skriabin, Skryabin, and (in French) Scriabine. The composer himselused the French spelling "Scriabine" which was a ...

’s second wife. His nephew, Tatiana's brother, was the music critic

Boris de Schlözer Boris Fyodorovich Schlözer (Schloezer) (Russian: Борис Фёдорович Шлёцер, sometimes a transliteration of ''Boris Fëdorovič Šlëcer'' or ''Boris de Šlëcer,'' born in Vitebsk 8 December 1881 – died in Paris 7 October 1969 ...

Controversy

He is unknown as a composer except for two études, Op. 1, for piano. The assertion made in reference materials – that

Sergei Rachmaninoff Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff; in Russian pre-revolutionary script. (28 March 1943) was a Russian composer, virtuoso pianist, and Conducting, conductor. Rachmaninoff is widely considered one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a compos ...

used Étude No. 2 in A-flat as his daily warm-up exercise – may also not be entirely accurate (one source refers to this story as a legend). There are several easily available recordings of the étude, such as by

Jorge Bolet Jorge Bolet (November 15, 1914October 16, 1990) was a Cuban-born American concert pianist, conductor and teacher. Among his teachers were Leopold Godowsky, and Moriz Rosenthal – the latter a renowned pupil of Franz Liszt. Life Bolet was born ...

and

Stephen Hough Sir Stephen Andrew Gill Hough (; born 22 November 1961) is a British-Australian classical pianist, composer and writer. Biography Hough was born in Heswall (then in Cheshire) on the Wirral Peninsula, and grew up in Thelwall, where he began pi ...

. There is also a famous 1933 recording by Eileen Joyce. The first recording, from 1907, was by the Liszt pupil Vera Timanova. Some historians believe that de Schlözer was not the composer of these études at all, and, given their virtuosity, it is very intriguing why nothing else from his pen ever appeared, or why he did not achieve any sort of recognition as a major pianist himself. The story goes that they were in fact written by Moszkowski, who lost the manuscript to de Schlözer in a card game, who published them as his own works.ed. Dmitry Feofanov, Dover Publications, "Rare Masterpieces of Russian Piano Music", Introduction, p. ix The de Schlözer Étude No. 2 is longer, more elaborate, and more technically demanding than the 11th of Moszkowski's ''15 Études de Virtuosité'', Op. 72, but both are in A-flat and in a similar bravura style. However, it may be that these similarities gave rise to the legend that de Schlözer pieces were written by Moszkowski.

References

External links

*
Ignacy Jan Paderewski: Letters to His Father and to Helena Górska, (A Selection), Ed. Małgorzata Perkowska-Waszek
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Schlozer, Paul Russian classical pianists Russian male classical pianists Russian male composers Composers for piano Polish people of German descent 1840s births 1898 deaths 19th-century composers 19th-century classical pianists 19th-century male musicians from the Russian Empire Academic staff of Moscow Conservatory