Askenase was born in
Lviv, then known as Lemberg, into a
Jewish family. At the age of five he began playing the piano with his mother, a pianist and pupil of
Karol Mikuli. He studied with Theodor Pollak, a professor and director of the
Ludwik Marek School of Music in Lemberg, then with
Emil von Sauer, a pupil of
Liszt, at the
Vienna Academy of Music. During
World War I he served in the
Austro-Hungarian army. In 1919 he made his debut in Vienna, and subsequently toured throughout the world. He lived in
Cairo and then
Rotterdam, where he taught at the
Conservatory of Music from 1937 to 1940. During the
Second World War he hid in
France. Askenase's first concert in Poland after World War II took place on 17 May 1946. In 1950 he became a naturalized
Belgian citizen and from 1954 to 1961 he taught at the
Brussels Conservatory of Music. He recorded extensively the works of
Chopin for the
Deutsche Grammophon label in the 1950s and 1960s. Stefan Askenase was also noted for his master-classes in
Hamburg,
Cologne and
Jerusalem. In 1965 he founded The Arts and Music Society, whose aim was to preserve the historical
Rolandseck railway station upon the river
Rhine near Remagen, Germany. After its restoration the building became a venue for artists such as
Pierre Fournier,
Hans Arp,
Oskar Kokoschka,
Yehudi Menuhin,
Martin Walser,
Marcel Marceau,
Henryk Szeryng,
Salvador Dalí and Askenase himself. His pupils included
Martha Argerich,
László Gyimesi,
John McKay,
André Tchaikowsky,
Mitsuko Uchida,
Naum Sluzsny and Mordehai Simoni. Stefan Askenase died in
Bonn on 18 October 1985, shortly after giving a concert in
Cologne. His wife Anny died in 1969. == Notable family members ==