Louis Lewandowski

The Encyclopedia Britannica identifies Louis Lewandowski as a Polish composer, although other lexicons classify him as a German-Jewish composer.[1]

Louis Lewandowski was born in 1821 in Września, located in the then Grand Duchy of Posen, which was formed in 1815 from part of the Duchy of Warsaw.[2] At the age of thirteen, due to the death of his mother and the family's extreme poverty, Lewandowski moved to Berlin to work as a singer in the choir of cantor Ascher Lion. During his stay in the Prussian capital, Lewandowski was introduced to Alexander Mendelssohn, who became his patron and whose support enabled him to enter the Royal Academy of Arts in Berlin – a school that had previously refused Jewish students. Lewandowski studied there, among others, with Carl Friedrich Rungenhagen (1778–1851), deputy director of the Sing-Akademie in Berlin and teacher of Stanisław Moniuszko, one of the leading composition teachers of the time.[3]

Lewandowski's studies at the Academy were interrupted by a debilitating nervous illness that lasted several years. While still ill, he attended a concert by the renowned hazzan Hirsch Weintraub. His arrangements of liturgical music made such a profound impression on the young student that from that moment on, he decided to focus his efforts on creating synagogue music. In 1844, Lewandowski was hired at the Old Synagogue in Berlin, where he founded and led the choir. He worked there as choirmaster for twenty-four years, preparing performances primarily of Salomon Sulzer's compositions and also introducing some of his own early choral compositions in four-part arrangements into the repertoire.

In 1866, Lewandowski received the honorary title of Royal Music Director. That same year, two years after the dedication of the New Synagogue in Berlin, he became director of its new choir. He also worked as a teacher, including at the Jewish Pedagogical Seminary, and served as honorary president of the Cantors' Association. In 1890, the Royal Academy of Arts awarded him the title of professor. By then, Lewandowski had become an extremely popular figure in Jewish musical life, partly due to his organizational work and the education of numerous prominent cantors.[4]
Lewandowski's work was shaped not only by the reformist trends in Jewish religious life but also by the unique instrument at his disposal. Alongside synagogue choirs and cantors, organs were already common in Berlin synagogues, including the largest synagogue instrument of the time, the organ in the New Synagogue on Oranienburgerstrasse. Based on this foundation, Lewandowski introduced a permanent organ accompaniment to his works and also created some of the most significant solo organ works of a sacred nature.

In 1871, Lewandowski published Kol Rinah U'Tfillah (The Voice of Song and Prayer) – a complete collection of music for performance on Shabbat and holidays. His groundbreaking work, Todah W'simrah (Thanksgiving and Song),[5] is a collection published in two volumes between 1876 and 1882, containing synagogue music for solo voice, choir, and optional organ accompaniment. To this day, both collections are used to accompany services in synagogues, including the famous Pestalozzistrasse Synagogue in Berlin, where Lewandowski's liturgical compositions and arrangements of his prayers are performed by cantors, choir, and organ.

Lewandowski wrote several collections of organ works. The first of these was Fünf Fest-Präludien, Op. 37, from 1871. Several untitled compositions for solo organ form an appendix to the second volume of Todah W’simrah. These works were commissioned by the Jewish communities in Nuremberg, Munich, and Stettin and were intended for performance during moments of silent prayer during the liturgy – hence their varying lengths and the possibility of dividing them into fragments and performing selectively.

In addition to the works mentioned above, the composer published collections of works for keyboard instrument (organ, harmonium, or piano): Small Pieces for Harmonium, Orgel or Klavier, Op. 44 (1891) and Synagogene-Melodien für Harmonium, Orgel or Klavier, Op. 47 (1895)[6].
Louis Lewandowski died on February 3, 1894. His grave is located in the Avenue of the Distinguished at the Berlin Weissensee Jewish Cemetery.
[1] www.britannica.com/biography/Louis-Lewandowski, accessed March 11, 2020.
[2] www.pw.ipn.gov.pl/pwi/historia/kulisy-powstania-wielko/8548,Wielkie-Ksiestwo-Poznanskie-Polacy-Niemcy-pruska-polityka-1815-1914.html, accessed March 11, 2020.
[3] www.chronologia.pl/biogram-ruca17780927b0.html, accessed March 11, 2020. [4] www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/9915-lewandowski-louis, accessed March 11, 2020.
[5] L. Lewandowski, Todah W'simrah, Ed. Bote & G. Bock, Berlin 1876.
[6] T. Frühauf, German-Jewish Organ Music…, op. cit., p. XII.