Władysław Daniłowski

Who was Władysław Daniłowski?

Władysław Daniłowski was a Polish and American pianist, composer and singer. A pioneer of jazz and tango in Poland, in the United States he is best known as a promoter of polka music. He wrote the score for the first Polish sound film.

Born April 26, 1902 in Warsaw, then in the Russian-held Congress Poland, to a renown Polish writer and revolutionary Gustaw Daniłowski. In 1919 he joined the Polish Army and served with distinction during the Polish-Bolshevist War. Following demobilisation he started studies at the Warsaw Conservatory. He studied piano under tutelage of Henryk Melcer-Szczawiński and theory of music in the class of Piotr Rytel. In 1926 he also graduated from the law faculty of the University of Warsaw.

In late 1920s Daniłowski spent two years working for the Polish embassy in Paris, where he fell in love with jazz and tango, two styles of music gaining increasing popularity in Europe at that time. Upon his return to Poland he started composing for the Qui Pro Quo cabaret. Numerous songs written for the star of the cabaret, Hanka Ordonówna, gained him much fame in Warsaw and then in the entire country. Also in 1928 he founded a Chór Dana, modelled after The Revelers. In 1929 he also formed an Argentinian Choir V. Dana which helped popularise tango in Poland, to the extent that already by the start of 1930s it started to be considered a part of Warsaw's folklore.