Zygmunt Noskowski's father, Józef Lada Noskowski, was a wealthy notary who supported eleven of his children and five of Andrzej Towiański, a Polish theosophist and philosopher, with whom Noskowski's mother, Amelia de Salisch-Noskowska, was an enthusiast. The Noskowski family home in Warsaw was one of the leading centers of Towianism in Poland, and they supported Towiański's activities in exile for many years. The Noskowski family ignored the work of Fryderyk Chopin, who spoke of Towiański and his teachings with irritation and contempt. Zygmunt Noskowski, despite the aversion to Chopin acquired in his homeland, became one of his most active propagators in Poland as an adult. Over time, he completely abandoned Towianism.
Noskowski began studying music at the Warsaw Real Secondary School in 1851. In addition to playing the piano, he also studied violin under the supervision of the famous teacher, Jan Hornziel. His musical talent was discovered by Ignacy Feliks Dobrzyński, whose figure, due to his unawareness of Chopin's achievements, remained for Noskowski, an example of a Polish composer. His first teacher was Stanisław Moniuszko, whose songs and some of his works he learned around 1860. Young Noskowski witnessed the pogrom of a patriotic demonstration of Russian troops in Warsaw on February 27, 1861. In the summer of that year, he took part in a trip to Kraków and the Tatra Mountains. All these events had a substantial impact on Noskowski's personality and were reflected in his subsequent creative, organizational, and journalistic activities.
After his father's death on June 23, 1863, he likely participated in the January Uprising.
In 1864–1867, he studied violin with Apolinary Kątski and counterpoint with Stanisław Moniuszko at the Warsaw Music Institute; he completed his studies with second prize. From 1867, he played in the orchestra of the Warsaw Grand Theatre, and from 1871 to 1872, he taught music at the Institute for the Deaf and Blind. From 1870, he was a music critic of the "Kurier Warszawski." He was socially active in the Warsaw Music Society. In 1872, he received a scholarship from the Warsaw Music Society. In December of the same year, he went to Berlin, where he studied composition with Friedrich Kiel at the Akademie der Künste. During these studies, he composed, among others, Variations and Fugues on a Theme by I. B. Viotti for string quartet (dedicated to Kiel), and from 1874, he worked on the First Symphony in A major, which he presented at a public concert in Berlin in April 1875 as a diploma work. Both critics and the public received this work well. After returning to Warsaw, Noskowski organized a concert of the composer on November 10, 1875, in the Resursa Obywatelska hall. The program, in addition to the First Symphony, included, among others, the overture Morskie Oko, which achieved considerable success. However, Noskowski's efforts to find permanent employment in Warsaw ultimately failed. Thanks to the recommendation of Friedrich Kiel, he finally secured the post of city music director and conductor of the Bodan Singing Society in Konstanz, where he likely arrived at the end of 1875 after marrying Stanisława Segedy, a piano graduate of the Warsaw Music Institute.
Noskowski's activity in Konstanz took place between 1876 and 1880. Under his direction, the Bodan Singing Society achieved the status of the best choral group in Baden, gained considerable authority among musicians, and the recognition of Grand Duke Friedrich I of Baden. Financial and family stability allowed for intensive creative work. In Konstanz, among others, the first cycle of Krakowiacy for piano is Piano Quartet op. 8, String Quartet No. 1, op. 9, and Symphony No. 2 in C minor "Elegy." In 1880, Noskowski met Liszt in Baden-Baden, who soon after took part in the first performance of his Piano Quartet op. 8. Noskowski's rising position did not go unnoticed by the Warsaw musical community. In 1878, he received an offer to become a teacher at the Music Institute, but he refused it. Instead, he established a collaboration with "Ech Muzyczny," publishing articles (including a series entitled "Drogowskazy") in which he harshly assessed the artistic relations in Warsaw, the poverty of concert programs, the dilettantism of critics, and the contempt for the works of Polish composers, among other issues. These articles were met with polemical outcry.
Despite the good conditions in which he lived and worked in Konstanz throughout the 1880s, Noskowski had the intention of moving to a larger center of musical life. Initially, he considered Weimar or Leipzig, but it is not known under what circumstances he received another offer from Warsaw, where the resigning director of the Warsaw Musical Society, Władysław Żeleński, proposed him as his successor. On November 25, 1880, this institution organized a concert featuring Noskowski, during which, in addition to the Morskie Oko Overture, already known to the public, he conducted the world premiere of his Symphony No. 2 in C minor, "Elegy." Despite the very low attendance, both works were well received by critics and the musical community. This fact likely influenced Noskowski's decision to accept the post of director of the Warsaw Musical Society. This finally occurred in January 1881, when Noskowski, along with his family, including his son Zygmunt Stanisław, relocated permanently to Warsaw.
The grave of composer Zygmunt Noskowski (1846-1909) in the Powązki Cemetery in Warsaw.
Noskowski considered the main task in his new position to be the reconstruction of musical life in Warsaw, which had been hindered throughout the 19th century and even suppressed in the post-uprising periods due to restrictions by the tsarist authorities and the pauperization of the city's inhabitants. Noskowski began by rebuilding the choir of the Musical Society, announcing memberships, and conducting free lessons in choral singing and musical rules for the newly appointed members. Then, he began to implement the idea of weekly symphony concerts in Warsaw. To this end, he made energetic efforts to establish a permanent symphony orchestra in Warsaw, whose primary task was to perform works by Polish composers. These attempts did not bring lasting success. The orchestra founded and conducted by Noskowski, which held its inaugural concert on May 8, 1881, went bankrupt after only a year, despite its inclusion in the structures of the Musical Society and the collaboration of such outstanding soloists as Aleksander Michałowski and Stanisław Barcewicz. Neither the subsequent orchestra, founded in May 1886, nor the amateur orchestra, founded in the same year—both organized and led by Noskowski—survived for long. The cause of the failures was huge financial problems, which forced the composer to cover the deficit from his pocket and, as a result, to seek income by writing music for unsophisticated plays and stage adaptations performed in garden theaters. After that, he abandoned more ambitious creative projects for a while. The next point in Noskowski's plan was to organize weekly chamber concerts, both within and outside the activities of the Musical Society, usually also with the participation of Michałowski and Barcewicz. Due to the shortage of funds, Noskowski himself performed there as a violinist, violist, pianist, and even a singer, which was sometimes mistakenly taken as a sign of his desire to promote himself. The energy with which he faced various challenges and his somewhat abrasive way of dealing with them made him many enemies; on the other hand, he was criticized for turning some intimate evenings into social gatherings and even dance parties, which he did to attract new members for the Musical Society, recruited from the wealthier strata of the middle class. Despite these controversies and several severe crises in the activities, thanks to Noskowski, musical life in Warsaw became more regular.
A key work for Noskowski is the Symphony No. 2 in C minor, composed between 1875 and 1879. In the autograph, this work is titled Symfonia Elegijna, and the final movement is entitled "Per aspera ad astra!" In the program of the concert in Kraków on April 6, 1883, all the movements bear programmatic titles:
1. Naród w niewoli [The Nation in Slavery];
2. Nadzieje i wezwanie do walki [Hope and Call to Arms];
3. Elegy poległym bohaterom [Elegy on the fallen heroes].
4. ‘Per aspera ad astra!’.
In this context, the title of the final movement acquires special significance: "Per aspera ad astra." It shows that it is adapted to reflect on the Polish struggle for national independence.
Noskowski's Second Symphony features several musical indicators intended to demonstrate its lucidity. The first and last movements begin with the motto motif, a three-note sequence (C – B – G) descending from the principal. In an article, Noskowski stated that this melodic figure was typical of Polish folk music. It was also used by many other European composers of the time to emphasize the "national" color of their music, most notably by the Norwegian Edvard Grieg.
In any case, this motif does not play any essential structural role in the outer movements of Noskowski's Second. It is, however, part of the broad elegiac melody of the slow movement, from which the entire work took its name. Some Polish dances in his Second Symphony also refer to Noskowski, specifically the "Kujawiak" in the first movement and the "Krakowiak" in the scherzo. In this respect, he follows the model of Ignacy Feliks Dobrzyński, who used several rhythmic Polish dances in each movement of his Symphony No. 2. Noskowski adapted Dobrzyński's idea of combining the change of mode with the use of a patriotic melody, but, as will be shown, he transferred it to a much higher level of structural complexity, accessible only to connoisseurs.
Noskowski ends his slow elegiac movement in the minor mode, apparently to avoid doubling the "per aspera ad astra" effect. He even adapted the central theme of the first movement of Dobrzyński's Symphony to his own; however, he uses it differently. In Dobrzyński's Symphony, the theme is introduced in the slow introduction pathetically and plaintively; it also opens the Allegro molto, where it is answered by a fortissimo explosion of the entire orchestra on a diminished seventh chord. This strong, almost operatic gesture apparently represents a collective cry of protest. In Noskowski's Symphony, the Dobrzyński theme is introduced in a rather discreet and veiled way by the lower voices at the beginning of the Allegro molto. The fortissimo dynamic is reached much later in the course of a complex process of motivic development.
Obviously, Noskowski wanted to avoid a simplistic "Deus ex machina" effect. In the finale, the melodic aspect of the song is carefully developed through the two themes of the last movement, which are both related to the central theme of the first movement and also to the song itself. The second theme is presented in E flat major in the exposition. It is followed by a coda in which several themes are composed simultaneously. In the development section of this movement, a fierce conflict culminates in the destruction of the thematic material, similar to Beethoven's first movement in the Eroica Symphony.
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