This article by Elaine Strauss was published in U.S. 1 Newspaper on November 24, 1999. All rights reserved.
Polish cellist Rafal Kwiatkowski, now 21, has been winning first prizes in musical competitions since he was 10. He has triumphed in Vina del Mar, Chile, and Ljubljana, Slovenia; in Warsaw, Poland, and in New York City. His most recent achievement was a first prize in the 1999 Young Concert Artists International Auditions in New York. Has he ever entered a contest where he did not win a first prize? Yes, he says, as if accomplishment can not be judged by first prizes alone. "I won a second prize in Cincinnati at the American String Teachers Association. I was 15 and the age limit for competitors was 19. I was very happy. I didn't expect to get anything. It was a big thing for me."
In New York last week, Kwiatkowski was taking advantage of one of the perks offered a Young Concert Artists International Auditions winner, a debut at New York's 92d Street "Y." He repeats his "Y" program at Richardson Auditorium on Thursday, December 2, accompanied by pianist Albert Tiu. The Richardson appearance is an award of the Princeton University Concerts Prize (PUCP), given for the first time this year. Made possible by an anonymous donor, the PUCP provides a $1,000 cash prize and an engagement in the Princeton University Concert Series. The PUCP is earmarked for a first prize winner in the international auditions sponsored by Young Concert Artists.
Young Concert Artists (YCA) is a non-profit organization designed to launch the careers of young artists. YCA provides management, concert engagements, recordings, publicity, and individual career guidance for a minimum of three years for its winners. The current roster of YCA includes two dozen young musicians; eight of them are violinists, and five are pianists. The rest sing or compose, or play cello, clarinet, marimba, viola, flute, or harp. Using the criteria of virtuosity, musicianship, and artistic individuality, the YCA jury may select multiple winners, or none. In 1999 seven first prize winners were selected. Among the noted musicians who began their careers with YCA are Emanual Ax, Richard Goode, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Carter Brey, Dawn Upshaw, and the Tokyo String Quartet.
Susan Wadsworth, who founded YCA in 1961, continues to play a hands-on role in the organization. She tracked down Albert Tiu as a pianist for Kwiatkowski's recitals. She also worked with Kwiatkowski on programming the debut concert, confirming some of his choices, and persuading him to alter others. Princeton listeners will hear a sonata in the sophisticated "galant" style of the 18th century by Francoeur -- Wadsworth's choice -- (Kwiatkowski originally proposed a sonata by Bach or Beethoven for this spot), Chopin and De Falla pieces about which both agreed, and the Barber sonata (whose length Wadsworth considered more appropriate than the longer Prokofieff or Shostakovich pieces that Kwiatkowski was promoting). Kwiatkowski learned the Francoeur and Barber pieces only within the last few months.
"I played all the pieces before with a pianist in Poland," Kwiatkowski says, just before his performance with Tiu. "The two pianists have different personalities, and see the music differently. I can't say which is better. We have to respect personalities. I'm very comfortable with both."
Kwiatkowski was born in 1978 in Warsaw, the only child of two professional cellists. His mother plays in the National Philharmonic of Warsaw. His father is with the Warsaw Opera. (The family name is pronounced "kvyot-cuff-skee.") Rafal began his cello studies at age seven. Knowing the difficulties of teaching one's own child, his parents had him study with a teacher outside the family. However, his father closely supervised Rafal's practicing at the beginning.
"My father spent four years with me every day," Rafal remembers, "listening to my playing, making remarks, and teaching me. He did a good job. He set my fingers and hands to get a good sound."
Kwiatkowski attended one of Warsaw's special public elementary schools that stress music, and went on to attend the Mlynarski School, one of Warsaw's two public high schools with an extensive music component. The school is named after the founder and conductor of the Warsaw Philharmonic, which has been in existence since 1905.
At age 14 Kwiatkowski won the junior division of Poland's Kazimierz Wilkomirski National Competition for Young Cellists, which enabled him to study at Towson State University in Maryland. "It was a big thing in my life, to change my surroundings, and leave my friends and parents," he says. "But I wanted to learn as much as I could about playing the cello. I did it for the cello and for my growth as musician. It was a great experience." At Towson, all his activities centered on music; he studyied cello and chamber music, and played in the university orchestra. "Cecylia Barozyk, my teacher in Towson, woke me up to music," says Kwiatkowski. "Before, I didn't understand too much."
Most difficult, he says, was the English language. "I was the only Polish person, and it was hard to understand. Also, I was the youngest person; the average age was about 20. Later I had lots of friends in Towson. People were nice to me. It's a good remembrance."
Barozyk treated her young student with tough love. "I lived with my teacher in her house," Kwiatkowski says. "I was 15. It was as if I had another parent during this time. She emigrated from Poland about 20 years ago. She didn't want to speak Polish with me, so I could learn more English. At the beginning I was angry. She pretended she didn't understand if I spoke Polish."
Kwiatkowski also had re-entry problems when he returned to Poland. "It was difficult to return," he says. "I had to get used to my friends. They had changed." Still, he says the stay in Maryland came at a convenient time, just before high school, so there was minimal disruption of his schooling. Kwiatkowski entered the Wilkomirski competition once again, this time in the 15 to 17 age group, and once again, he won. "The second time I didn't go to Towson," he says, "because I didn't want to interrupt my studies again."
Kwiatkowski's path to New York as a Young Concert Artists international auditions winner put him in competition with 512 applicants from 43 countries. He was one of two winners in the European branch of the competition, held in Leipzig, Germany, which attracted over 100 artists from 29 countries. Air transportation and housing in New York were among the awards for the Europeans.
At the moment Kwiatkowski juggles the concert performances scheduled by YCA with attending Warsaw's Chopin Academy of Music, where he studies with Andrzej Orkisz. "I will stay in the United States till December 7, since my last concert for Young Concert Artists is on December 6. It's a great thing that Young Concert Artists takes care of me. But I have to return to Warsaw to study." Kwiatkowski has already learned how to cope with balancing performing and studies in Poland. "When I have concerts in Poland, and have to go to another city, it's disturbing to my studies. To get through I study a lot for exams at the end of the semester."
Kwiatkowski is in his second year at the Academy, on a scholarship awarded by the Polish Ministry of Culture. He is enrolled in a special program for the gifted that keeps his general studies to a minimum. Still, he faces examinations in January and June on the history of art and on English as a language. "I don't want to finish too early. I would like to remain in the hands of my teacher. It's good for someone to hear me. Also, if I finish too soon the army will get me."
Poland's new capitalism and democracy do not necessarily bring advantages to performing artists, Kwiatkowski says. "In recent years Poland has become international, and there are no longer empty shops. Some people are really rich, but life is expensive. It's really hard for musicians, harder than during communism. Under communism there was more attention to culture than now. We musicians don't produce anything. The country doesn't need us."
Yet Kwiatkowski pursues his music. He prefers chamber music to the big virtuoso pieces for solo cello. "Chamber music is the heart of music," he says. The six Bach suites for unaccompanied cello occupy a special place for Kwiatkowski. These high points of the cello literature strike cellists with terror until they grow into the pieces. "They're in a different class from other cello music," Kwiatkowski says. "It's the greatest music for cello solo." Kwiatkowski has already exposed himself to the suites. The second and fifth are his favorites, and he played the first suite when he was younger.
Kwiatkowski's musical horizons are wide. "Elegance," he points out, "is not always the goal. Shostakovich, which has so much energy, doesn't have to be beautiful; it must be violent." Kwiatkowski has recorded the Shostakovich Concerto No. 1 with the Polish Radio and Television Symphony Orchestra. In September he recorded the Schumann cello concerto with the same orchestra. "I was happy because it was music I wanted to record. I like this concerto very much; it's close to my heart. I like romantic music, and this is the most romantic cello concerto written."
Recording has no disadvantage compared to live performance, in Kwiatkowski's view. "I like to record," he says. "What I like is that we can play the piece as many times as we want to get what we want. Sometimes when you listen to a live performance and a recording, the piece has a different life. But I put in the same emotion when I record and when I play." Kwiatkowski asks if I mind waiting while he looks up a word in his dictionary. When he returns, he says decisively, "I never feel impassive or indifferent at a recording session."
I am impressed with the refinement of his choice of words. Because of his serviceable vocabulary and his solid sense of sentence construction our conversation has no linguistic dead ends. If he keeps that dictionary handy, he is within range of reaching in English the subtlety that he must have when he uses Polish.
With various other interests, it is not clear how high a priority the English language is for Kwiatkowski. He likes to attend concerts. "I can learn a lot from listening to others," he says. When he's not involved in music, nature attracts him. "I like cycling and walking," he says. "I have a very nice girlfriend," he adds, referring to pianist Justyna Stecko, a fellow student at the Chopin Academy. The two started playing music together this year, and plan to perform together in the Shostakovich piano trio.
Then practicing cello takes time, and so does preparing for still more competitions. Kwiatkowski finds virtue in readying musical material for competition. "Competitions are good for motivating you to work," he says. "You have to select a program, and prepare it well. Competitions are good for learning new pieces. Technique is basic, but beyond this, good music must be made. You have to practice something. So why not practice for the competition."
-- Elaine Strauss