Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra

Founded in 1901 by a group of Polish business leaders and musicians, the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra has survived through the tumultuous changes that have beset its city and its homeland, emerging changed but with its essential values intact. The soloist in the first concert was Paderewski, Poland's future prime minister, and the orchestra was installed in a splendid hall influenced by the design of the Paris Opéra. Until 1939 that hall was one of Poland's cultural centers, and the orchestra, under first conductor Emil Mlynarski and his successors, played host to soloists li...