Ministerstwo Kultury i Dziedzictwa Narodowego

HIRE LIBRARY WEBSHOP ONLINE - SHOP PBM

Composers

Antoni Stolpe

1851-1872

Antoni Stolpe, younger, born 23 May 1851 in Puławy, died September 7, 1872 year in Meran (now Merano, Tyrol), pianist and composer, son of Edward. He started to learn the piano in Puławy with his father and in 1862 continued in his father’s class at the Music Institute in Warsaw; he also studied composition with A. Freyer, and in the years 1866-1867 with Stanisław Moniuszko. In 1867 he graduated with a "Grand Prize" for playing the piano and first prize for progress in the art of counterpoint. He made his debut July 17, 1867 in the Resursa Obywatelska together with student award winners from the Music Institute, playing an etude by Chopin and his “Mazurka in B-flat minor”. On March 22, 1868, he gave his own concert n the hall of the A. Hoffer piano factory in Warsaw, presenting five compositions: “Sextuor E minor”, “Ouverture in E minor” in a version for piano 4 hands and string quintet, “Scène dramatique”, “3 songs in the form of etudes” and “Song” to words by V. Hugo for voice accompanied by string quintet. In concerts on December 11, 1868 and May 14, 1869, the proceeds of which he allocated to his studies in Berlin, Stolpe appeared as a pianist and conductor, also presenting his new pieces, including the "Concert Ouverture", "Hommage à Mendelssohn", "Piano Trio", "Ave Maria", two songs, as well as the works of F. Chopin, K. Kurpiński, Z. Noskowski, F. Liszt and Meyerbeer; Z. Noskowski and singer Józefa Turowska-Leśkiewiczowa, Stolpe's mother's sister, took part in these concerts. In June 1869 he moved to Berlin to study with F. Kiel, who already on February 5 declared Stolpe’s education complete, emphasising special talent and progress on the certificate. Further, Th. Kullak, with whom Stolpe took piano lessons at the Neue Akademie der Tonkunst, soon gave him one of the piano classes in the school. In Berlin, he probably presented his Warsaw compositions, and it is also known that he composed and performed his new pieces; at the show performance of the upper classes of the Academy he played the first movement of his "Sonata in D minor" for piano and - with the professors of the university – Mendelssohn’s "Piano Trio in C Minor". In 1872 he received a WTM scholarship. The recurrence of tuberculosis, which he inherited from his ancestors, forced him to return to Warsaw; treatments in Salzbrunn (now Szczawno-Zdrój in Lower Silesia) and Merano proved to be too late.