Biography
A pupil of Lisowski and Gremm, Szymanowska launched her performing career with a piano recital in Warsaw followed by another in Paris. Cherubini and Goethe both expressed strong admiration for her artistry; the former inscribed his Fantasia in C-minor to her, while the latter dedicated the verses of “Aussohnung.” Extensive tours across Europe earned her the official designation First Pianist to the Russian court. Turning exclusively to pedagogy in 1828, she established her residence in St. Petersburg. Her piano compositions anticipated the Romantic period and stand chronologically before those of Chopin. Among them, Vingt exercises et preludes offered early signs of the technical and expressive directions that would later flourish.