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Artist
Wanda Landowska
12+ albums
Classicalbaroqueharpsichordmusicologistfemale
about
Wanda Landowska (July 5, 1879 – August 16, 1959), harpsichordist whose performances, teaching, recordings and writings played a large role in reviving the popularity of that instrument in the early 20th century. She was the first person to record Bach's Goldberg Variations on the harpsichord (1931). Landowska was born in Warsaw, where her father was a lawyer, and her mother a linguist who translated Mark Twain into Polish. She began playing piano at the age of four, and studied at the Warsaw Conservatory with Kleczynski and Michalowski. She also studied composition with Heinrich Urban in Berlin. After marrying the Polish folklorist Henry Lew in 1900 in Paris, she taught piano at the Schola Cantorum there (1900-1912). She later taught harpsichord at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik (1912-1919). Deeply interested in musicology, and particularly in the works of Bach, Couperin and Rameau, she toured the museums of Europe looking at original keyboard instruments; she acquired old instruments and had new ones made at her request by Pleyel and Company. These were large, heavily-built harpsichords with a 16-foot stop and owed much to piano construction. They have largely fallen out of fashion in the past four decades, and have done much to harm the modern appreciation of Landowska's recordings. A number of important new works were written for her: Manuel de Falla's El retablo de maese Pedro marked the return of the harpsichord to the modern orchestra. Falla later wrote a harpsichor
top songs
1
The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I, BWV 846-869/Prelude XIX in A
4422The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book II, BWV 870-893/Prelude XVII in A-Flat (Remastered 1988)
2713Nuit d'automne
2384Prelude I in C
1485Fugue I in C
1466Prelude II in C minor
1367Fugue II in C minor
1218Prelude III in C-sharp
1149Fugue III in C-sharp
11010Piano Sonata No. 12 in A-flat Major, Op. 26: I. Andante
106albums
Bach: The Landowska Recordings
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Wanda Landowska in Peformance, Vol. 2
Bach: Goldberg Variations etc.
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Wanda Landowska: Nuit d'automne
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Treasury of Harpsichord Music & Dances of Ancient Poland
Landowska: F. Couperin & Rameau - Harpsichord Works
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Des Sylphes. Brilliant Piano from the Golden Age
D. Scarlatti: Keyboard Sonatas
Landowska: J.S. Bach - Goldberg Variations, Italian Concerto
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Berceuse. Mendelssohn, Schubert & Beethoven in Time
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Horizons. Piano Music of Mozart & Chopin
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The Complete Piano Recordings