View source for Andrzej Dobrowolski

Andrzej Dobrowolski (September 9, 1921 – August 8, 1990) was a [[:Category: Poland|Polish]] composer and teacher. 

== Biography ==
He studied organ with Bronisław Rutkowski, clarinet with Ludwik Kurkiewicz and singing with Stefan Belina-Skupiewski at the Warsaw Conservatory during the war and afterwards in the State High School of Music in Kraków between 1945-51, with Stefania Łobaczewska (theory) and Artur Malawski (composition). He went on to teach theory and, later, composition in Kraków and then Warsaw at the State Higher School of Music, becoming a Professor at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz in 1976, where he taught composition and electronic music.<sup>[1]</sup>

Dobrowolski was one of the first Polish composers to concentrate on music for tape, and one of the first to pioneer the combination of pre-recorded tape and live performers.<sup>[2]</sup> He was one of the first composers to use the Experimental Studio of the Polish Radio in Warsaw, which was founded in 1958<sup>[1]</sup>, as well as the Institut für Elektronische Musik at the Hochschule für Musik in Graz.

In 1969 he was decorated with the Gold Cross of Merit. In 1971 he received the Minister of Culture and Arts Award, in 1972 - the Award of the Polish Composers' Union for all his artistic achievements, and in 1990 - the Johann Joseph Fux Music Award of the Government of Styria.
Dobrowolski wrote a theoretical study entitled Metodyka nauczania harmonii w szkołach muzycznych II stopnia [Methodology of teaching harmony in secondary music schools] (PWM, Cracow 1967). 

== Style and activities ==
When in 1958 one of the world’s first studios of music for tape - the Experimental Studio of the Polish Radio - was founded in Warsaw, Andrzej Dobrowolski was one of its first users. Together with [[Włodzimierz Kotoński]], [[Zbigniew Wiszniewski]] and [[Bogusław Schaeffer]], he played a key role in the history of Polish music for tape, determining the directions in which it developed until the 1970s. 

Andrzej Dobrowolski’s first work in which he applied the new electro-acoustic technology was ''Music for Tape No. 1'' recorded in the Experimental Studio of the Polish Radio in 1962. The input sound material was derived from a variety of sources, which was a new idea, as the earlier pieces from the Warsaw Studio had been based on homogeneous sound material. Dobrowolski used polytones from generators, piano chords, voices and the sounds of the piano resonating box into which individual vowels were exclaimed. Despite such heterogeneous sources, ''Music for Tape No. 1'' is characterized by a unity and integrity of sound, which is distinctly “electronic” in character. This is due to the identical structuring processes to which the composer submitted all the sounds collected on the tape. 

The publication of the score of this piece by PWM Edition was an extraordinary event: works for tape usually exist only as a unique studio recording and are virtually never published as a score. Music for Tape No. 1 was performed, or rather - played back - twice at the “Warsaw Autumn” festival (in 1962 and 1963). Virtually each subsequent electronic piece by Andrzej Dobrowolski was later presented at that festival, almost invariably becoming a major event in the programme. In 1966, ''Music for Magnetic Tape and Solo Oboe'' inaugurated a series of pieces which combined a “live” performer with music from loudspeakers. This work was followed by ''Music for Strings, Two Groups of Wind Instruments and Two Loudspeakers'' (1967), ''Music for Tape and Piano'' (1971), ''Music for Tape and Double-Bass'' (1977), ''Music for Tape and Bass Clarinet'' (1980). ''S for S'', Electronic Music from 1973 was purely electronic; finally, in 1988, Dobrowolski wrote ''Passacaglia für TX'' in which the almost 70-year-old composer used computers.

Electro-acoustic works were by no means the dominant of artistic expression for Andrzej Dobrowolski. Throughout his life, he made use of various musical genres, but even in the field of purely symphonic music one can hear in his works the “electronic” sound which he created by breaking down conventions related to the traditional sound structure of the orchestra. 

== Selected works ==
* Symphonic Variations for orchestra (1949) 
* Overture for symphony orchestra (1950-51) 
* Concerto for bassoon and orchestra (1953) 
* Symphony No. 1 (1955) 
* Trio for oboe, clarinet and bassoon (1956) 
* Eight Studies for oboe, trumpet, bassoon and double-bass pizzicato (1958-59) 
* Music for Magnetic Tape No. 1 (1962) 
* Music for String Orchestra and Four Groups of Wind Instruments (1964) 
* Music for Magnetic Tape and Solo Oboe (1965) 
* Music for Strings, Two Groups of Wind Instruments and Two Loudspeakers (1966-67) 
* Music for Orchestra No. 1 (1968) 
* Krabogapa for clarinet, trombone, cello and piano (1969) 
* Amar. Music for Orchestra No. 2 (1970) 
* Music for Magnetic Tape and Solo Piano (1971-72) 
* Music for Solo Tuba (1972) 
* Music for Orchestra No. 3 (1972-73) 
* S for S (Study for Synthi) for tape (1973) 
* A-LA. Music for Orchestra No. 4 (1974) 
* Music for Mixed Choir, Two Groups of Wind Instruments, Double-Basses and Percussion (1975) 
* Music for Magnetic Tape and Solo Double-Bass (1977) 
* Music for Three Accordions, Mouth-Organ and Percussion (1977) 
* Passacaglia. Music for Orchestra No. 5 (1978-79) 
* Music for Magnetic Tape and Solo Bass Clarinet (1980) 
* Music for Orchestra No. 6 (1981-82) 
* Musik für Grazer Bläserkreis for 8 trumpets, 8 horns, 8 trombones, 2 tubas and percussion (1984) 
* Music for Orchestra and Solo Oboe (1984-85) 
* Flüchten - music for chamber ensemble and reciting voice to a text by Wilhelm Muster (1985-86) 
* Music for Orchestra No. 7 (1986-87) 
* Passacaglia für TX [1st version] computer music for tape (1988) 
* Passacaglia für TX [2nd version] computer music for tape (1989) 
* String Quartet (1989) 

== External links ==

[https://www.polmic.pl/index.php?option=com_mwosoby&view=czlowiek&id=33&Itemid=0&lang=en Polish Music Information Centre biography and worklist]

== References ==
# "[https://www.polmic.pl/index.php?option=com_mwosoby&view=czlowiek&id=33&Itemid=0&lang=en Polskie Centrum Informacji Muzycznej]". www.polmic.pl. Retrieved 2018-07-31.
# Adrian Thomas, Polish Music since Szymanowski (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 162.
# Casken, John. 2001. "Dobrowolski, Andrzej". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. S. Sadie and J. Tyrrell. London: Macmillan.
# Thomas, Adrian. 2005. Polish Music since Szymanowski. Music in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-58284-9
# [http://post.at.moma.org/profiles/908-andrzej-dobrowolski Andrzej Dobrowolski] in MoMa's post online resource devoted to art and the history of modernism in a global context

[[Category: Polish Figures]]