Tadeusz Wroński (1915–2000)

Wroński’s Story—A Diplomat, A Modern Entrepreneur: Postwar Reconstruction in Poland and Institutional Initiatives

To understand a person and his achievements, it is necessary to understand his place, time, and political context, and to synthesize these into one entity. According to Wroński, the lack of written records on the subject of violin pedagogy in postwar Poland (1945–1986) encouraged him to leave a record of the development from his own perspective. ¹⁶ In turn, the record of his subjective lived experiences has allowed others to observe Wroński, his life, career, and influences in the context of violin pedagogy during the second half of the twentieth century.

Tadeusz Wroński was born in Warsaw, Poland, on April 1, 1915, to Stanisław Wroński and Zofia Wrońska. His father was a horticultural engineer, or gardener; his mother worked at home. Wroński wrote that theirs was not a particularly musical home in the formal sense; his mother occasionally would sing to herself while she worked but no one in the family attended concerts; gramophones were rare, and the radio had not yet been invented. ¹⁷ As he told it, his relationship with the violin began solely by his own request. He told the story of a dream he had when he was four or five years old. He dreamt that he was standing in a hallway when an old man with a white beard came up to him with a violin, knelt down, and began to play a beautiful melody. Wroński said that the melody stayed with him and he would whistle it occasionally. When he was six years old, his mother took him on a vacation to Ciechocinek, a famous spa and resort where the Warsaw Philharmonic performed during the summer. Each day he would go to the outdoor amphitheater, sit in the front row (where children were not allowed) and become mesmerized by the music. One day he heard the melody from his dream. The young Wroński marched up to his mother and declared that he would like to play the violin. While she supported his wishes, she worried that his father—a serious man who hoped that his son would become an engineer or doctor—would argue against this new hobby. And so, the first few months of violin lessons took place in secret. However, when at Christmas the young Wroński performed carols for his father, the man was so moved that he permitted his son to continue his violin studies. ¹⁸

At the age of fifteen, Wroński became a student of Józef Jarzębski (1889–1955) at the Warsaw Conservatory. ¹⁹ He still did not participate in musical events outside of lessons, nor did he practice very much—as he recalls it, only about thirty minutes before his lesson each week. He later claimed that no one had told him that he needed to practice more, and that he needed to do it every day. ²⁰ It would seem that his extraordinary talents compensated for his lack of preparation and when he eventually found out that he should practice one or two hours daily, he quickly rose through the ranks to become the top student in the school. Wroński credited his limited practicing as the reason for his lifelong quest to discover the most efficient method of practicing. ²¹

He graduated from the Conservatory with distinction in 1939, at the age of twenty-four. In the meantime, in July of 1937, he married Halina Radlińska. According to Wroński, World War II halted the development of what has been suggested by his biographical notes as a promising career, but he was not conscripted and kept performing in small orchestras and intimate performance venues as a soloist and chamber musician. ²²

In 1945, at the end of World War II, Wroński moved to Sopot—a small seaside city and resort on the Baltic coast—where, with Zbigniew Turski, he established the Baltic Philharmonic. He was its first musician and concertmaster. ²³ During that time he often performed solo with the orchestra. Wroński traveled all over Poland to recruit other musicians. In addition to his concertmaster post, he also began his teaching career at the Music Institute in Sopot. ²⁴ His involvement in the artistic scene was not limited to playing and teaching. He initiated the formation of the Baltic Philharmonic Advisory Board. ²⁵ At the age of thirty he was chosen as president of the musicians’ union (ZZM) in Gdańsk. ²⁶ As president of the ZZM, in collaboration with the Central Liquidation Office (Główny Urząd Likwidacyjny), ²⁷ he took inventory of all of the pianos left in the area homes after the war and organized their distribution to artists and musicians living in the Gdańsk region. Generally, Wroński tried to avoid postwar politics, instead carefully observing everything happening around him during this time of change.

Wroński seemed to be very much concerned with and involved in the well-being of musicians in Poland. He is credited as being one of the founders of SPAM-Stowarzyszenie Polskich Artystów Muzyków [Polish Association of Musicians] and SPAL Stowarzyszenie Polskich Artystów Lutników [Polish Association of Luthiers], of which he was an honorary member. ²⁸

Hoping to get a scholarship to study abroad, in 1946 Tadeusz Wroński returned to Warsaw, where he once again became involved in an organizational effort of musicians. ²⁹ This time it was with the goal of rebuilding the National Philharmonic in Warsaw. He was elected secretary of the committee dealing with the rebuilding of the Philharmonic. There were several subcommittees focusing on legal issues, architectural needs, employment, recruiting, and auditioning of musicians from all over Poland. ³⁰ The orchestra, both facilities and musicians, needed to be rebuilt.

Much like the concert halls, after the war, the music-publishing infrastructure in Poland needed to be rebuilt as well. In 1945, no violin music was being printed in Poland; one could find several pieces published before the war and a few copies of foreign editions. ³¹ Collaborating with the Polish music publishing company (PWM), Wroński and his colleagues made a list of several hundred violin works that they felt needed to be published in Poland. They were sorted in order of urgency of anticipated publication, the titles were divided among the leading Polish violin pedagogues, and within a decade Polish editions of all of the necessary works were available in print. ³² This group also initiated Polish translations of foreign pedagogical literature, such as Hungarian pedagogue Carl Flesch’s “The Art of Violin Playing,” which is—to this day—globally considered as a staple in the international canon of pedagogical string literature. The winner of the contract to translate this work was Emil Górski, who was selected on the basis of his translation of a fragment of the work. However, soon after beginning his work he presented the publishing house, PWM, with a list of about 150 German terms that had no Polish equivalents. ³³ To solve this problem, a collaborative group of violinists, linguists, and publishers created Polish-language equivalents for all of these terms. ³⁴

In 1947 Wroński became a student of André Gertler at the Conservatoire Royale de Musique in Brussels, from which he graduated with the distinction of the Première Prix. ³⁵ Upon his return to Poland, he was appointed to the Academy of Music in Warsaw in the fall of 1949, first as Professor of Violin and then as Dean of the Department of Instrumental Music. ³⁶ Early during his tenure at the academy, a program of postgraduate studies began—training a very select group of students to eventually become successors to the faculty. Faculty from all over Poland jointly administered the entrance exams to these students, regardless of their specialization. Wroński wrote that it was during these sessions that he met many of Poland’s greatest artists and pedagogues of the day—his colleagues—and learned from them how one should discuss issues, pose theses, disagree, and other skills of diplomacy. He referred to this gathering as “his real university.” ³⁷

During the 1950s, Polish pianists established collaborative summer teaching workshops in Łagów and invited the violin faculty to join them. Łagów had an important and controversial role in the postwar cultural life of Poland. In August of 1949, the Polish Ministry of Culture and Art organized a conference in Łagów in western Poland, inviting musicologists, composers, and performers to debate on the implementation of socialist realism in Polish music. This conference resulted in the creation of a Festival of Polish Music, the goal of which was to be “a celebration of the music of the new People’s Republic of Poland and a staging-post in the overriding cultural-political issue of the time, the development of socialist realism in Polish culture.” ³⁸ In the words of the Minister of Culture at the time, Włodzimierz Sokorski: “We felt, however, that the goals of the Festival extend far beyond the usual demonstration of so-called ‘achievements.’ Because the chief task of the Festival is the fight for the new, socialist face of Polish music.” ³⁹ Wroński makes no indication that the summer workshops of the instrumentalists were as politically charged as the 1949 conference, perhaps because it is harder to politicize actual instrumental performance; nevertheless, the Łagów setting carried a set of implications. At the workshops, faculty would jointly listen to each student play, discuss his or her performance and progress, and make recommendations that would then be up to the teacher to convey to the student in his or her lesson. These discussions amongst the faculty and the pooling of pedagogical philosophies and resources ultimately resulted in a conceptual framework for instrumental (violin) pedagogy in Poland, and a juried system for annual evaluation and elimination of students in elementary, middle, and high schools. The workshops in Łagów also had another purpose. They served as a training camp of sorts for violinists who were to represent Poland on the international stage. Two years before every Wieniawski Competition, the faculty selected a preliminary group of potential competitors. ⁴⁰ These young people trained in Łagów, and a select few ultimately represented Poland in the competition.

By the mid-1950s, Wroński’s pedagogical and performance career had fully developed; he performed across Europe and Asia as a soloist and chamber musician. Over the years he made a number of recordings—solo, with orchestra, and chamber music. One of his collaborators was the pianist Władysław Szpilman—portrayed in the 2002 Roman Polański film “The Pianist.” Wroński also performed with his own string quartet and Szpilman’s famous Warsaw Piano Quintet. ⁴¹ With these ensembles, he traveled throughout Europe and beyond, enjoying a certain measure of freedom, which was off limits to most citizens. ⁴² By his own account, one of his most memorable performances was during a tour with the National Philharmonic of Poland. He performed in the Palais des Beaux Arts in Brussels, where he had listened to many concerts as a student some years earlier. André Gertler, his old professor, was in the audience, with twenty-seven of his students, as well as Queen Elizabeth, who not only gave him a standing ovation but also asked to meet him. ⁴³

However, things were about to change. In 1952, the Wieniawski Violin Competition—which had been established in Warsaw in 1935—was reestablished in Poznań because of the extensive destruction suffered by the capital city during the war. ⁴⁴ Prior to the 1957 competition, a debate was held to discuss the issue of its permanent location. Wroński advocated for Warsaw, as opposed to Poznań, which many considered more “provincial,” and a temporary solution until Warsaw could rebuild its concert venues from the wartime destruction. The competition was ultimately located in Poznań, but during the course of the negotiations Wroński seemed to have made an enemy of a powerful political figure and suddenly his international concert career came to a halt. Given the unfavorable circumstances surrounding his career in Poland, in 1966 Wroński came to the United States, where he made his on-again, off-again pedagogical home at Indiana University, in Bloomington, Indiana. He was invited to the faculty by the legendary violin pedagogue, Josef Gingold, who was teaching at Indiana University. ⁴⁵ Between 1966 and 1986, Wroński divided his time between Warsaw and Bloomington, where he held both visiting and tenured teaching positions. ⁴⁶ His appointment status varied as he traveled back and forth between the United States and Poland. He was a Professor of Music with tenure between August 1976 and April 1981, and a Visiting Professor of Music from 1966 to July 1976, 1981 through December 1982, and again from 1983 to 1986. ⁴⁷ He taught an assortment of students at Indiana University: some talented, some not, ⁴⁸ some majoring in performance, or in music education, and others who followed him all the way from Poland. Of his American students, some seemed to find him by chance, occasionally another teacher would suggest that they take a lesson from him, their own teacher was away during the summers, or they simply found his name on their schedule. ⁴⁹ Back in Poland he served as President (rektor) of the Chopin Music Academy in Warsaw between 1973 and 1975.

Upon his permanent return to Poland in 1986, Wroński was initially disappointed to find what he described as the “ruins” of what he and his contemporaries had created over the years: the decline of a Polish school of violin playing, the decay of the collaborative spirit among the country’s leading violin pedagogues, the absence of new pedagogical literature and a lack of the old editions, the decline of the Wieniawski Competition, the dissolution of the Łagów workshops due to discord in the piano faculty, and a general lack of support or interest from the political powers in the Ministry of Culture and Art. ⁵⁰ However, only three years later, the situation and Wroński’s view of it had changed dramatically. Writing in 1990—after a change of political system—Wroński expressed optimism about the future of the field in Poland, new annual summer violin workshops in Żagań to replace those in Łagów, and a violin competition that he had organized in the Academy of Music in Warsaw, which would eventually grow into an international event. ⁵¹

The International Tadeusz Wroński Competition for Solo Violin: One-of-a-Kind

Upon finally returning to Poland following his last semester in Bloomington, Indiana in 1986—and after a number of informal precursors—Wroński established the world’s first official competition for solo violin. ⁵² It was January of 1990 in Warsaw, Poland, and Professor Wroński named his competition “Konkurs Tadeusza Wrońskiego na skrzypce solo,” or literally, “Tadeusz Wroński’s Competition for Solo Violin.” Not, as he was quick to point out in an interview, “The Tadeusz Wroński Competition”: “I am not a monument! It was just my competition.” ⁵³ He used his own resources to organize it and to fund prizes; he put together a jury of former students from all over the world. The jury was compensated for its work with dinners.

It was a new concept: a competition whose repertoire consisted exclusively of works for solo violin. But for Wroński it was an idea that had been forming for years, beginning with a 1958 competition honoring the 100-year anniversary of the birth of Ysaÿe, with repertoire consisting of sonatas by Bach and Ysaÿe. Several years later, collaborating with professor Stanisław Kawalla, Wroński organized a performance of all of Telemann’s Fantasies for solo violin. During his time in Bloomington, Indiana, he organized a student competition for the best performance of Paganini’s Caprices. With these experiences under his belt, Wroński was convinced that there was enough repertoire of excellent quality to merit a competition for solo violin. ⁵⁴ Others agreed. Violinist Rugierro Ricci went as far as to call it “the only true violin competition in the world precisely because it is a competition for solo violin.” ⁵⁵

The first two competitions were organized by Wroński, with help from students and colleagues. About thirty young Polish violinists between the ages of fifteen and thirty took part in the first competition in 1990. In January 1992, the second competition expanded with twenty-two participants performing from a field of thirty-seven applicants. The competition still had a national profile, with Polish competitors, although the first prizewinner was a student at London’s Royal College of Music. ⁵⁶

The third competition, held on the cusp of February and March in 1995, went through some changes. The competition—its promotion and organization officially taken over by the Chopin Music Academy (currently the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music)—elevated its status to a major musical event in Warsaw. The age limit was expanded to thirty-two, and the jury included not only Professor Wroński and his students, but also other distinguished Polish violinists. The promotional materials were published in three languages, anticipating the expanded profile of the event. This time the list of participants included several violinists from outside of Poland.

In April of 1997, seven years after its inception, the competition was opened to violinists from all over the world—the first official international edition. The age limit for participants was scaled back to twenty-six, while the competition itself was expanded to three rounds instead of the previous two. For the first time the members of the jury included artists from around the world, such as Ruggiero Ricci from the United States.

On January 15, 2000, Tadeusz Wroński died, only weeks before the second international iteration of the competition bearing his name. His friends, family, and colleagues decided to go ahead with the competition in Wroński’s honor. ⁵⁷ It took place in February with Krzysztof Jakowicz as the chairman of the jury. The honorary chairman, violinist Ruggiero Ricci, was also absent due to serious illness. ⁵⁸ The membership of the jury was more diverse than ever before, with 60 percent of its members coming from outside Poland. ⁵⁹

The 2004 competition, held in February, was the first without any input from its original creator. As previously, the competition was held in the Chopin Music Academy. The participants represented nine different countries, the jury six.

The IV International Tadeusz Wroński Competition for Solo Violin took place in September 2009 under the patronage of the President of Poland and the Mayor of Warsaw. ⁶⁰ A record number of applicants participated, representing twelve different countries. This event was co-organized by the newly established Fundacja SKRZYPCE im. Taduesza Wrońskiego (The Tadeusz Wroński Foundation for the Violin).

In March of 2015 the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music hosted the V International Tadeusz Wroński Solo Violin Competition. This time the eight days of performances were streamed live, allowing the world to follow the 38 violinists through the three stages of the competition. The repertoire included a required work by Bartosz Kowalski, commissioned specifically for the competition. The year 2015 was also the centenary of Prof. Wroński’s birth. A symposium was held at the conclusion of the competition to mark the occasion and to celebrate Tadeusz Wroński’s life and work, with speakers converging from around the world in person, via Skype, and by letter.

Wroński’s Vision for String Educator Training in the United States

Tadeusz Wroński was a product of the master–apprentice model of instruction of the European conservatory. He also devoted his life to refining his own pedagogical approaches as a teacher within that very model, with the goals of training the most accomplished of artists for careers as solo artists and chamber and orchestral musicians. These approaches have been extensively documented in his canon of pedagogical literature. During the twenty years that Wroński spent teaching in Bloomington, Indiana, he had ample opportunity to witness the pedagogical differences between instrumental higher education in the United States and Europe/Poland. He was also introduced to a different kind of student—one that he had not encountered in Europe—the pre-service public school music educator. In Poland he worked with the most talented and accomplished of students. In the United States he had a more diverse studio of students with varying career aspirations: performers, instrumental teachers, future public school educators, etc. While the pedagogical differences shocked him initially—as he confessed in a 1979 article—over time he grew to understand their foundations and purpose within American society. ⁶¹

He wrote about his observations in Murray Grodner’s “Concepts in String Playing”; ⁶² the chapter was translated into English by T.S. Robertson. In his article, Wroński focused specifically on the Bachelor of Music Education (BME) degree, which had no exact equivalent in Europe at the time. He was struck by the sheer number of skills and expectations of BME students in North American universities. Instead of merely teaching general music and music appreciation classes, and perhaps conducting a choir or small ensemble—as might be expected of music educators in some other countries—the Music Education students in the United States had to have extreme versatility in teaching theory, general music, music appreciation, conducting orchestras, bands, and choirs, as well as being able to play all of the orchestral and band instruments to some degree. Despite the intense academic load required of the BME students, they were (and still are) expected to perform at a relatively high level on their major instrument at the end of their four-year degree program. Here was the source of Wroński’s concern. Starting with students who—in his experience—were less talented and accomplished than their counterparts pursuing applied performance degrees, and who had significantly less practice time, a teacher had to train them to achieve a similar level of playing as the more accomplished students who entered the university as stronger players and had more time to practice. His answer to this quandary was to use specific teaching materials that would be appropriate for this unique set of circumstances. The problem was that such materials did not exist in print. Yet Wroński had a plan to remedy that using excerpts of various etudes and repertoire—some of it less known. He laid out a clear path for what needed to be done in order to remedy the situation. Wroński’s solution included the following steps, as listed in “Concepts in String Playing,” edited by Grodner in 1979:

On his own, Wroński took on a number of these suggestions, but not in the United States. His life-long pursuit of efficiency in practice drove him to write volumes on how to approach practicing, on violin fingerings, intonation, setup, and the notion of talent. He edited a number of works with contemporary fingerings and bowings. ⁶⁴ He also wrote what could be considered a textbook on the methodology of violin playing. ⁶⁵ Extensive fragments of that book were translated into English, but that translation never appeared in print.

Despite his roots in the performance sphere, and despite working in a conservatory-type environment where music performance and music education programs often seem to have few commonalities, Wroński identified the unique needs of the string music education student. This appears to be his only written commentary on the BME degree—a program that initially baffled him because it was so different from what he was familiar with in Europe. His assessment of these needs and his proposed remedy are a tremendous contribution to the music education community.

Conclusion