He was born in
Breslau,
Kingdom of Prussia (now Wrocław,
Poland), into a wealthy Polish-Jewish family whose parents had come to Breslau from
Pilica, near
Zawiercie, in 1854. He was an ardent Jew at a time when many Jews downplayed their Jewishness. He showed early talent while very young, beginning his musical training at home until 1865, when his family moved to
Dresden. There he continued his piano studies at the conservatory. He moved to
Berlin in 1869 to continue his studies first at the
Julius Stern Conservatory, where he studied piano with
Eduard Franck and composition with
Friedrich Kiel, and then at
Theodor Kullak's
Neue Akademie der Tonkunst, where he studied composition with
Richard Wüerst and orchestration with
Heinrich Dorn. There he became close friends with the Scharwenka brothers,
Xaver and
Philipp. In 1871 he accepted Kullak's offer to become a teacher in his academy; as he was also a more than competent violinist, he sometimes played first violin in the orchestra. In 1873, Moszkowski made his first successful appearance as a pianist, and soon began touring the nearby cities in order to gain experience and establish his reputation. Two years later he was already playing his piano concerto on two pianos with
Franz Liszt at a matinée before a selected audience invited by Liszt himself. Retaining his post as a teacher at the
Berlin conservatory from 1875, he had among his pupils
Frank Damrosch,
Joaquín Nin,
Ernest Schelling,
Joaquín Turina,
Carl Lachmund,
Bernhard Pollack, Ernst Jonas, Wilhelm Sachs, Helene von Schack, Albert Ulrich and Johanna Wenzel. Moszkowski then travelled successfully throughout Europe with the reputation of being an exceptional concert pianist and brilliant composer, having also gained some recognition as a conductor. In 1884, Moszkowski married the younger sister of pianist and composer
Cécile Chaminade, Henriette Chaminade, with whom he had a son named Marcel and a daughter named Sylvia. By the mid-1880s, Moszkowski began suffering from a neurological problem in his arm and gradually diminished his recital activity in favor of composing, teaching and conducting. where he lived on rue Nouvelle with his son and daughter. In 1906, he lost his 17-year-old daughter Sylvia while his son was engaged in the French army. In Paris, he was frequently sought after as a teacher, and was always generous in investing his time on aspiring musicians. Among his Parisian students were
Vlado Perlemuter,
Thomas Beecham (who took private lessons in orchestration with him on the advice of
André Messager in 1904),
Josef Hofmann (of whom he claimed once that there was nothing anyone could teach him),
Wanda Landowska, and, informally,
Gaby Casadesus. In the summer he rented a villa near
Montigny-sur-Loing owned by the French novelist and poet
Henri Murger. The concert netted
US$13,275 (the equivalent of US$187,793.67 in May 2017), with one part transferred to the Paris branch of the
National City Bank of New York in order to provide immediate relief from his financial problems, and an annuity purchased at the
Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, whereby he would receive US$1,250 annually for the rest of his life. However, Moszkowski's illness lingered and he died from stomach cancer on 4 March 1925, before the supply of funds could reach him. The money raised went instead to pay his funeral expenses and to his wife and son. ==Works==