[2] A favorite of concert audiences around the world, his musical fame gave him access to diplomacy and the media, as well as, possibly, his status as a freemason,[3] and the charitable work of his second wife, Helena Paderewska.

Wilson included that aim in his Fourteen Points and argued for it at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference, which drew up the Treaty of Versailles.

[4] Shortly after his resignation from office, Paderewski resumed his concert career to recoup his finances, and rarely visited the politically chaotic Poland thereafter, the last time being in 1924.

His mother, Poliksena, née Nowicka, died several months after Paderewski was born, and he was raised mostly by distant relatives.

Modrzejewska arranged for a public concert and joint appearance in Kraków's Hotel Saski to raise funds for Paderewski's further piano study.

[9][10] On 31 May 1899, he married his second wife, Helena Paderewska (née von Rosen, 1856–1934), shortly after she received an annulment of a prior marriage.

[9] Audiences responded to his brilliant playing with almost extravagant displays of admiration, and Paderewski also gained access to the halls of power.

The story centres on a doomed love triangle, social inequality, and racial prejudice (Manru is a Gypsy), and is set in the Tatra Mountains.

In 1904, Paderewski, accompanied by his second wife, entourage, parrot, and Érard piano, gave concerts in Australia and New Zealand, in collaboration with Polish-French composer Henri Kowalski.

Despite his relentless touring schedule and his political and charitable engagements, Paderewski left a legacy of over 70 orchestral, instrumental, and vocal works.

Paderewski's love of his country is reflected in the titles of his compositions, including Polish Fantasy [Fantazja polska], op.

[13] By the turn of the century, Paderewski was an extremely wealthy man, generously donating to numerous causes and charities, and sponsoring monuments, among them the Washington Arch in New York, in 1892.

Paderewski's status as an artist and philanthropist and not as a member of any of the many Polish political factions became one of his greatest assets and so he rose above the quarrels, and he could legitimately appeal to higher ideals of unity, sacrifice, charity, and work for common goals.

[17] In World War I, Paderewski became an active member of the Polish National Committee in Paris, which was soon accepted by the Triple Entente as the representative of the forces trying to create the state of Poland.

Paderewski became the committee's spokesman, and soon, he and his wife also formed other organizations, including the Polish Relief Fund in London, and the White Cross Society in the United States.

He kept such a demanding schedule of public appearances, fundraisers and meetings that he stopped musical touring altogether for a few years, instead dedicating himself to diplomatic activity.

In January 1917, on the eve of the American entry into the war, US President Woodrow Wilson's main advisor, Colonel House, turned to Paderewski to prepare a memorandum on the Polish situation.

Two weeks later, Wilson spoke before Congress and issued a challenge to the status quo: "I take it for granted that statesmen everywhere are agreed that there should be a united, independent, autonomous Poland."

However, it soon became clear that no plan would satisfy both Jewish leaders and Roman Dmowski, the head of the Polish National Committee, who was strongly anti-Semitic.

Paderewski and Roman Dmowski represented Poland at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference and dealt with issues regarding territorial claims and minority rights.

[23] There were some achievements during Paderewski's ten-month period in government: democratic elections to Parliament, the ratification of the Treaty of Versailles, legislation on protection of ethnic minorities in the new state, and the establishment of a public education system.

But Paderewski "proved to be a poor administrator and worse politician" and resigned from the Government in December 1919, having received criticism for his perceived submissiveness to the Western powers.

In 1936, two years after his second wife's death at their Swiss home, a coalition of members of the opposition met in the mansion and was nicknamed the Front Morges after the village.

The exiled German-born director, Lothar Mendes, directed the feature, which was released in Britain in 1937 as Moonlight Sonata, and was re-titled The Charmer when re-released in the US in 1943.

[33] In early 1941, the music publisher Boosey & Hawkes commissioned 17 prominent composers to contribute a solo piano piece each for an album to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Paderewski's American debut in 1891.

At his recitals, with house lights lowered and the atmosphere sombre and awesome when he was about to sit on the piano stool, I always felt someone should pull it from under him.

Paderewski became Prime Minister of Poland, but I felt like Clemenceau, who said to him during a conference of the ill-fated Versailles Treaty: "How is it that a gifted artist like you should stoop so low as to become a politician?

"There is an anecdote in circulation about Paderewski having been booked for a concert at Stanford by the future president Hoover and not receiving the full fee for his performance.

Thomas F. Schwartz, Director of the Hoover Presidential Library, concludes: There seems to be enough doubt by both Hoover and Paderewski to lend credence to the story in their respective memoirs other than to acknowledge that their first meeting may have been in 1896.His unusual combination of being a world-class pianist and successful politician led to Saul Kripke using Paderewski as a famous philosophical example in his article "A Puzzle about Belief.

[47] On 8 October 1960, the United States Post Office Department released two stamps commemorating Ignacy Jan Paderewski.