Henryk Opieński

Henryk Opieński (13 January 1870 – 21 January 1942) was a Polish composer, violinist, teacher, administrator and musicologist. His writings on, and collected letters by, Frédéric Chopin, were considered of paramount importance in Chopin studies of the time.

Opieński was born in Kraków in 1870, and he commenced his study of the violin with Vincent Singer there. When aged 12 in 1882, he participated in a juvenile prank with three other boys by tolling the Sigismund Bell.

Between 1888-92 he studied chemistry at university in Prague to please his parents, while continuing his violin studies with Ferdinand Lachner. From 1892-94 he returned to Kraków and worked in the chemical industry, being appointed controller of distilleries at Żółkiew and Rzeszów. He then resumed his study of composition with Władysław Żeleński.

In 1895 he went to Paris, where he had further violin studies with Wladyslaw Gorski, and further composition studies with Zygmunt Stojowski and Ignacy Jan Paderewski, who became a close lifelong friend. In 1897 and 1898 he had composition studies with Heinrich Urban in Berlin, while working as a violinist. In 1898 he returned to Paris to study with Vincent d'Indy at the Schola Cantorum de Paris. He also played violin with the orchestra of Édouard Colonne 1899-1901.

Back in Poland from 1901, he continued his life as a violinist and also founded the choir of the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra.

From 1904-06 he worked with Arthur Nikisch (conducting) and Hugo Riemann (musicology) in Leipzig. In 1906 he made his debut as an operatic conductor at the Municipal Theatre in Lviv.

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