5 May 1937 Felix Labunksi (1892-1979), a composer from Warsaw, gave a lecture at the Curtis Institute on "Four Centuries of Polish Chamber Music". Recordings were played and there was also also some live music making including Juliusz Zarębski (1854-1885), Piano Quintet in G minor Op.34, played by Jorge Bolet, piano, Marian Head and Julius Schulman, violins, David Schwartz, viola, and Leonard Rose, cello. Of the quintet, Adrian Thomas (Professor Emeritus at Cardiff University

I'm not sure how I missed this. A little more detail from Jorge Bolet on Godowsky. He was speaking in 1983 to Carola Grindea for her book Great pianists and pedagogues. (The "lessons" as such were around 1932/33 in New York City.) Further information from this website: ‘Jorge’s scores of these pieces bore Godowsky’s markings in red crayon—the daunting “Passacaglia,” based on themes from Schubert’s “Unfinished” symphony; the “Fledermaus” and “Künstlerleben” symphonic metamo

Mid-1930s photo from the Curtis Institute website

John Gruen interviewed Jorge Bolet for a long article which appeared in The New York Times on 28 January 1973. I've referred to it often (I love the Poe/Hawthorne bit) but here's the text. To sit in a desperately cheerful New York hotel room with Jorge Bolet is to know the meaning of absolute contradiction. The Cuban‐born pianist is simply too imposing and disquieting a figure to meld easily with screaming red‐and‐orange curtains, and wildly patterned bedspreads. He demands

Thomas Sauer, a professional musician who is also on the music faculty of Vassar College (Poughkeepsie, New York) and of the Mannes School of Music (NYC), has generously offered some memories of his time with JB at Curtis. Thomas Sauer's personal website link The first thing to note is that I arrived at Curtis at age 16 with a limited repertoire, having played the piano for seven years. In other words, very green. In no way was I deserving of a place in Mr. Bolet's studio.

Makoto Ueno has generously sent me some memories of his time studying with Jorge Bolet at Curtis. See also here for part 2. Professor Makoto Ueno [b.1966, Muroran, Hokkaido, Japan] left his home town at the age of 16, to study in the West, first at Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where he became one of the last six students of Jorge Bolet, then continued at Mozarteum Salzburg with Hans Leygraf. In addition to being a performing and recording artist, since 1996 he

A fellow student in the same year as Jorge Bolet (1927) was Sidney Foster (born in Florence, South Carolina, in 1917) who was aged 10, the youngest student Curtis ever took. (In 1968 Foster, a Professor at Indiana School of Music 1952-77, was to coax Bolet there from Spain as a teaching colleague.) Imelda Delgado in a book on Foster relates a shocking event in which in 1929 the young Sidney was dismissed from Curtis for being a "bad boy", though it later turned out that i

Jorge Bolet with Mrs Mary Louise Curtis Bok and David Saperton ( Diario de la Marina , 28 December 1934) The Chattanooga Daily Times (14.10.1938) reported that Mrs Bok has said that all she has done and put into the Curtis Institute is justified in this one student.