Ksiądz Wacław Gieburowski (zarys biografii)

Abstract

The entries on professor Wacław Gieburowski in many lexicographical sorces contain a lot of erroneous information, the verification of which provided a basis for further work on his life and deeds. Wacław Kazimierz Gieburowski was born on the 6th of February 1877 in Bydgoszcz. He studied philosophy and theology and took holy orders in the city of Gniezno. In the years 1902-1909 he worked as a pastor in several parishes of the Gniezno archidiocese. He participated in a course of church music in Regensburg in 1908. In 1909 he fulfilled the duties of the so called choir vicar in Poznań Cathedral. Then he became a lecturer in church music in the seminary in Poznań. In 1915 he got his doctor's degree from the University of Wrocław for his dissertation about the medieval musical treatise "Musica Magistri Szydlovite". He was lecturer in the theory and history of music in the University of Poznań from 1919, from 1920 lecturer in the Gregorian chant at the Poznań Conservatory. He passed his examination for the right to teach at the universities as docent in Lwów in 1922. His numerous academic papers are mainly about the Gregorian chant and the use of church music in Poland. In 1914 he became choirmaster of the boys' and men's choir in Poznań Cathedral. Under his direction the choir became world famous thanks to the transmission of masses from the church, thanks to radiobroadcasts and because of many concert Journeys, some of them abroad (Prague 1929, Vienna, Budapest, Frankfurt 1936, Paris 1937). He was also composer of many choral works. He was arrested by the Gestapo in 1939, interned in Kazimierz Biskupi, and released half a year later. He helped in pastoral work in Poznań. Then he was obliged to.leave Poznań in 1942 and he set for Warszawa where he died on the 27th of November 1943. His body was transported to Poznań in 1946 and placed in the vaults of the Graves of Men of Distinction in the church of Saint Wojciech.