![Fantasia on the Theme of Niewiadomski's Songs for piano [salon orchestra] (1927)](/upload/thumb/2024/09/koffler_fantazja-z-piesni-niewiadomskiego_strona_01_auto_1800x900.jpg)
Fantasia on the Theme of Niewiadomski's Songs for piano [salon orchestra] (1927)
Instrumentation: piano / salon orchestra (flute, clarinet, trumpet, trombone, two violins, double bass, piano, harmonium, percussion)
Publication: Fantasia on the Theme of Niewiadomski's Songs. "Salon Orchestra No. 4". Arrangement – J. Koffler, orchestration – M. Uhl. G. Seyfarth, Lwów [n.d.]. G. S. 222.
Radio premiere: Warsaw, 6 August 1927 (Kurier Warszawski 1927, no. 214)
Movements: 'Panna i żołnierz' [The Maiden and the Soldier], 'Maki' [Poppies], 'Nie wiem sam' [I Don’t Really Know], 'Największy pan' [The Most Powerful Lord], 'Powrót' [Return], 'Jakże cię mam brać dziewczyno' [How Am I to Take You, Girl], 'Tajemnica' [Secret], 'Na gody' [For the Wedding], 'Niańka króla Heroda' [King Herod’s Nanny], 'Śmieją się złote łany' [Smiling Golden Cornfields], 'Latawica' [Latavitsa]
An undated sixteen-minute piece published by G. Seyfarth in Lwów in Koffler’s arrangement and Martin Uhl’s orchestration. The piano version served as a ‘guide’.
It leads the audience through such songs as ‘The Maiden and the Soldier’, ‘Poppies’, ‘No Matchmaking between Us’, ‘I Don’t Really Know’, ‘The Most Powerful Lord’, ‘Return’, ‘How Am I to Take You, Girl’, ‘Secret’, ‘To the Wedding’, ‘King Herod’s Nanny’, ‘Smiling Golden Cornfields’, and ‘Latavitsa’. Such a salon medley may have enjoyed considerable popularity, especially since the works of Stanisław Niewiadomski, one of Poland’s greatest art song composers after Moniuszko, were very familiar to the bourgeoisie in Lwów and elsewhere. Koffler’s Fantasia is known to have been broadcast by Polish Radio in Warsaw on 6 August 1927 (Kurier Warszawski 214 (1927)). This was probably the work’s premiere. Soon afterwards, Niewiadomski started contributing to the Orkiestra journal, of which Koffler was the editor in chief.