Maestro Marek Jablonski: Tribute to a Mentor-page 2
After that, it was the whirlwind career of many a respected and
gifted player. Europe, the US, South America-at its height,
Jablonski's performing career saw him present 50 to 100 concerts a
year. He became a noted interpreter of Liszt and Rachmaninov,
among others. In 1971, the National Film Board produced a
full-length film it only had to title Jablonski.
But it was his playing of fellow Pole Fryderyk Chopin that was
always his greatest triumph. A review in a Polish newspaper judged
that, "Jablonski proved himself a representative of a Chopin
tradition most truly Polish, in the great manner of Paderewski,
Rubinstein, and Malcuzynski."
For one of Canada's most noted pianists, Jon Kimura Parker, it was
that air of the great recitalist that was, for Parker as a
talented teen spending summer after summer studying with Jablonski
in Banff, part of the teacher's magnetism. In Jablonski, Parker
saw the sort of performer he always imagined a Rubinstein to be.
Edmonton pianist Corey Hamm sees that in Jablonski too. "He
was a true artist, you know?" Hamm notes. "Something
lofty. We have this romantic notion of an 'artist'-that's what he was."
Jablonski came to the faculty at the University of Alberta in
1992, and continued to give master classes at Banff and throughout
Canada, North America, and Europe. And while his days as an international touring virtuoso were behind him by then, he
continued to give almost annual recitals at the U of A's
Convocation Hall-recitals dominated by the works of Chopin, the
composer with whom he seemed so imbued. In an age when faculty
recitals by university professors seemed to attract only that
teacher's students and a few music lovers, Jablonski's
performances at Con Hall routinely sold out.
Heritage Community Foundation Presents
