On 12 July 2019, President Andrzej Duda signed a decision to grant posthumously Order of Polonia Restituta First Class, the Great Cross, to Bogusław Schaeffer. Among Polish civilian awards, the Order is second only to the rarely awarded Order of the White Eagle.
Bogusław Schaeffer, one of the most original figures on the Polish music scene, has died on 1 July 2019 in Salzburg. His funeral will take place on 16 July at the Municipal Cemetery in Salzburg. During the ceremony, the outstanding composer and music historian will be posthumously awarded the Great Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta.
Bogusław Schaeffer distinguished himself by extremely wide creative interests, a consistently avant-garde attitude and controversial aesthetic views. As a composer, he was very innovative and bold in experimenting with new forms, genres and types of music. As one of the first Polish artists, he took up electronic music. The first Polish musical happening was his work Non-stop (1960). He was also the first on in Poland to compose in the genre of instrumental theater in the TIS MW2 (1963) work written for the famous experimental group MW2. Almost in every work he solved a new compositional problem, challenging the Polish musical milieu and arousing lively discussions on new music. He was an outstanding theoretician of new music. His work New music. The problems of contemporary compositional technique (1958) remain the basic theoretical source in this field, and Introduction to Composition (1976) is the only one of its kind in the world literature. Stefan Kisielewski called Bogusław Schaeffer "the father of new music in Poland."
The city of Kraków will commemorate the Professor with a plaque in the National Pantheon in the St. Peter and Paul church's vault. In October, the 11th edition of the Scheaffer's Era Festival will take place in Warsaw, Łódź and Katowice. Each festival's performance will be a multimedia show combined with acting and exhibition of Schaeffer's graphic works. Moreover, the premiere of Rehelsals (Próby) directed by Mikołaj Grabowski at the 'Polonia' Theater in Warsaw is planned for the autumn.