1910

Well, know Turka only in summer; I get to know the late but sudden Carpathian spring and the unforgettable smell of meadows and hey. I spend winters with my mother in Zakopane, in Dłuski’s sanatorium – its large building still stands to this day at the foot of Mount Gubałówka, far away at the end of the Kościeliska Valley, though the name is different of course. My mother was already suffering from a lung condition at the time and the doctors believed then that the the best treatment for diseases of the thorax – as they used to be called – was the Zakopane climate with its rains, snow, mud and wind…

1911

I also remember a trip to Lviv, mainly because it was then that I saw a real policeman for the first time in my life. He stood in Mariacki Square wearing a dark green Waffenrock with a sword and on his breast there was a golden crescent with some numbers on it.

1912

I can’t remember when my mother started to take me to church, it’s difficult to say exactly; what I do remember though is that I had to put on a white shirt with a sailor collar which would always get dirty after I met other children. Interestingly, I can’t remember any music from those Masses. Perhaps there was no organ in the church? But this is hardly possible.

1913

The last year of the established order; soon the First World War will break out and everyting will change. This is how Roman Palester described this old world towards the end of his life:

This world was – as usual – full of friendship and hostility, love and hate, passion and indifference, games and horrors, but it was also a world of established values and a compromise which did not shy away from violence, guaranteeing at the same time a certain regularity in life that allowed thoughtful people to plan their careers, relations and reasonable proportions of happiness and troubles.

1914

In spring Palester begins his piano lessons with Mrs Pilszak. The composer recalls:

It was probably in spring 1914 – at least I think it must have been then – that my father took me to a school where I was told to read something, write something, add or substract something and then they said that the doctor’s little son had passed the exam from grade one to grade two […]. More or less at the same time I went with my mother to a friend of hers, Mrs Pilszak, who had a piano in her drawing room. […] My mother admitted that she and my father wanted to buy a piano, provided I would go to Mrs Pilszak for my lessons twice a week and then work at home on everything she would give me to do. I agreed immediately – and thus my fate was decided. […] Piano playing was infinitely better than all my toys. I decided I would play the piano all my life. I got over that later – fortunately!

After the war broke out Palester’s father is called up by the Austrian authorities and sent to the front. Matylda Palester and her son set out through Sambor, Chyrów, Lesko and Zagórz to Prague and then to Vienna. Mother and son spent the winter in a rented room in Favoritenstrasse.

Sometime during the holidays my mother went to the opera to see Parsifal. She didn’t take me with her because she said the work would be too serious for me. Next day I had a look at the programme she brought back from the theatre. There were numerous excerpts from the score, melodies with very complex chords comprising semibreves and minims. My conclusion was that classical music had to be played very slowly – it was all semibreves and minims.

1915

In the early spring of 1915 the Palesters move to Teplice. Roman attends a German school and continues his piano lessons. They spend their holidays in Jędrzejów with Roman’s father.

To make it up to me for Parsifal, my mother took me to a matinee one Sunday, to a performance of the children ballet Die Puppenfee […] Neither the performance nor the interior of the famous Hofoper made any impression on me, simply because the only thing I was struck by – immediately and greatly – was the orchestra! We must have been sitting in a balcony, because I had a good view of all the instruments and coulnd’t get my eyes and ears away from them.

But my most important experience in Teplice was Fraulein Thorandt. She was a tiny old lady, dry as a bone, never smiling but moving quite quickly. She had a piano store – with dozens of intruments filling up the rooms in the ground floor of her small house. I don’t know how my mum discovered her, but after an audition she decided she would give me piano lessons, provided I also came to her to practise under her tutelage. She was a versatile musician, for she also gave violin lessons. At the beginning I hated the old hag, because she was very strict, shouted at me and slapped me on the hands – but later I began to like her, because I saw that thanks to her I could discover a huge number of new things about music.

1916

Towards the end of the year the Palesters move to Zakopane where they settle in the Modrzejów villa on Mount Antołówka. Roman continues his music lessons and spends his holidays with the Przypkowski family in Jędrzejów.

The Przypkowskis’ house is very pleasant. There are always many people in it – mostly soldiers who became friends with the hosts during the fightings of the First Brigade near the Nida River. In the drawing room stands a piano on which we practise a lot. I say ‘we’ in the plural, because the daughter of our hosts, Hassa, who is one year younger than me, also plays. This is my first encounter with chamber music of sorts. We play four-hand arrangements of various overtures from German operas, and there is an officer who often brings a violin with him and has to be accompanied.

1917

In September Roman Palester is admitted to grade I of the Second Private Grammar School in Zakopane (“Liliana”). He plays the tubaphone in the school’s orchestra.

The Palesters move to the Sariusz pension in Chałubiński Street.

I remember going to this school for two years and having very fond memories from that period. Professor Bielawa, who taught Polish, Wuttke – geography, Stecki – natural sciences, Hahn – Latin and Cichocki – German (he later became one of the protagonists of Choromański’s book Zazdrość i medycyna [Jealousy and Medicine]) – they were all people of solid horizons.

1918

Roman Palester continues his education in Zakopane. His father works in Cracow. Though he often comes to Zakopane, Roman misses a true home. His mother’s health continues to deteriorate.

1919

Matylda Palester dies on 19 August.

What I felt then was a sense of complete void; I usually didn’t have any close relationship with my father and now I suddenly understood that I had lost a person dearest to me, that this was irrevocable and that nothing could be done.

Roman moves to Cracow where he lives together with his father in a former clinic on the corner of Radziwiłł and Kopernik Streets. The boy is later taken care of by Zofia Przypkowska, who lives at 8 Lenartowicz Street. Roman begins his education at the state secondary school in Krupnicza Street and attends Klara Umlauf’s Musical Institute.

Mrs Przypkowska replaced my mother in all the matters concerning upbringing and the material side of life but she could not – despite her willingness – replace my mother when it came to the intimacy of feelings, because I didn’t show enough trust in her. I was difficult.