Szpilman describes the scene :< p > I played Chopin ’ s Nocturne in C sharp minor.

Szpilman later played in a cafe on Sienna Street and also the Sztuka Cafe on Leszno Street.

Szpilman played Chopin's Ballade No. 1 Op. 23.

Władysław Szpilman studied the piano in the early 1930s in Warsaw and Berlin.

Szpilman began his study of the piano at the Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw, Poland, where he studied piano with Alexander Michalowski and Josef Smidovicz, first-and second-generation pupils of Franz Liszt.

Surprisingly, the officer did not kill Szpilman, but instead after finding out that he was a pianist, asked Szpilman to play for him on a piano they had found.

Other CDs with the works of Szpilman include Works for Piano and Orchestra by Władysław Szpilman with Ewa Kupiec ( piano ), John Axelrod ( director ), and the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra ( 2004 ) ( Sony BMG ) and the Original recordings of The Pianist and Władysław Szpilman-Legendary recordings ( Sony classical ).

When not touring or building pianos, he has been editing piano editions of the works of Władysław Szpilman for Boosey and Hawkes and wrote a piece on aesthetics, which was published in Poland in March 2005.

In addition to the methods of smuggling mentioned previously, Szpilman observed many child smugglers at work.

Again, the experience of those in the bigger ghetto is best described by Szpilman: Dozens of beggars lay in wait for this brief moment of encounter with a prosperous citizen, mobbing him by pulling at his clothes, barring his way, begging, weeping, shouting, threatening.

Eventually, Szpilman was posted to a steady job as “ storeroom manager .” In this position, Szpilman organised the stores at the SS accommodation, which his group was preparing.

At around this time, the Germans in charge of Szpilman ’ s group decided to allow each man five kilograms of potatoes and a loaf of bread every day, to make them feel more secure under the Germans ; fears of deportation had been running at especially high levels since the last selection.

So, at great risk, Szpilman came down from the attic to find a working oven in one of the flats.

From then on, Szpilman decided to stay hidden on the roof every day, only coming down at dusk to search for food.

The officer went with Szpilman to take a look at his hiding place.

Lednicki told Szpilman of a German officer he had met at a Soviet Prisoner of War camp on his way back from his wanderings after the defeat of the Warsaw Uprising.

After the war Szpilman resumed his musical career at Radio Poland in Warsaw.

Szpilman died in Warsaw on 6 July 2000 at the age of 88.

House at 223 Niepodległości Avenue in Warsaw where in 1944 Szpilman met Wilm Hosenfeld

Photo of Szpilman, the most famous of Robinson Crusoes of Warsaw | Warsaw Robinsons, at the Warsaw Uprising Museum

A member of the Jewish Police ( Itzchak Heller ) pulled Szpilman from a line of people — including his parents, brother, and two sisters — being loaded onto a train at the transport site ( which, as in other ghettos, was called the Umschlagplatz ).

In November 1944, Szpilman was hiding out in an abandoned building at 223 Niepodległości Avenue when he was found by a German officer.

When Szpilman resumed his job at Polish Radio in 1945, he did so by carrying on where he left off six years before: poignantly, he opened the first transmission by once again playing Chopin's Nocturne in C sharp minor ( Lento con gran espressione ), the piece he was playing as the German bombs hit the studios of Polish Radio, interrupting its broadcast on 23 September 1939.

From 1945 to 1963 Szpilman was director of the Music Department at Polish Radio.

House at 223 Niepodległości Avenue in Warsaw where Wilm Hosenfeld was helping Władysław Szpilman

On December 4, 2011, a commemorative plaque in Polish and English was unveiled at 223 Niepodległości Avenue in Warsaw, the place where Hosenfeld discovered Szpilman, in the presence of Hosenfeld's daughter Jorinde.

They hid their money in the window frame, an expensive gold watch under their cupboard and the watch ’ s chain beneath the fingerboard of Szpilman ’ s father ’ s violin.

Because of Stalinist cultural policy, and the ostensibly " grey areas " in which Szpilman ( Waldorff ) asserted that not all Germans were bad and not all of the oppressed were good, the actual book remained sidelined for more than 50 years.

Szpilman and his family were fortunate to live in the small ghetto, which was less crowded and dangerous than the other.

After much effort, Szpilman managed to extract from him a promise that Henryk would be home by that night, which he was.

From the window of the flat in which he was hiding, Szpilman had a good vantage point from which to watch the beginnings of the rebellion.

Hiding in a predominantly German area, however, Szpilman was not in a good position to go out and join the fighting: first he would need to get past several units of German soldiers who were holding the area against the main power of the rebellion, which was based in the city centre.

As soon as he took the sleeping pills, which acted almost instantly on his empty stomach, Szpilman fell asleep.

On 30 August, Szpilman moved back into his old building, which by this time had entirely burnt out.

Here, in larders and bathtubs ( which, due to the ravages of the fire, were now open to the air ) Szpilman found bread and rainwater, which kept him alive.

By October 14 Szpilman and the German army were all but the only humans still living in Warsaw, which had been completely destroyed by the Germans.

Szpilman is widely known as the protagonist of the 2002 Roman Polanski film The Pianist, which is based on his memoir of the same name recounting his survival of the German occupation of Warsaw and the Holocaust.

Szpilman managed to find work as a musician to support his family which included his mother, father, brother Henryk, and two sisters, Regina and Halina.

In 1963, Szpilman and Gimpel founded the Warsaw Piano Quintet, with which Szpilman performed worldwide until 1986.

Szpilman ’ s family was lucky to already be living in the ghetto area when the plans were announced.

Whenever he went into the large ghetto, Szpilman would visit a friend, Jehuda Zyskind, who worked as a smuggler, trader, driver or carrier when the need arose.

But before his death, in the winter of 1942, Zyskind supplied Szpilman with the latest news from outside the ghetto, received via radio.

After hearing this news and completing whatever other business he had in the large ghetto, Szpilman would head back to his house in the small ghetto.

After his work on the wall Szpilman survived another selection in the ghetto and was sent to work on many different tasks, such as cleaning out the yard of the Jewish council building.

Hidden inside his bags of food every day, Majorek would bring weapons and ammunition into the ghetto to be passed on to the resistance by Szpilman and the other workers.

Through Majorek, Szpilman managed to arrange his escape from the ghetto.

On February 13, 1943, Szpilman slipped through the ghetto gate and met up with his friend Andrzej Bogucki on the other side.

Szpilman and his family did not yet need to find a new residence, as their apartment was already in the ghetto area.

Szpilman was left in the ghetto as a laborer and helped smuggle in weapons for the coming Jewish resistance uprising.