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Antoni Wit

Antoni Wit, one of the most highly regarded Polish conductors, studied conducting with Henryk Czyz and composition with at the Academy of Music in Kraków, subsequently continuing his studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. He also graduated in law at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. Immediately after completing his studies he was engaged as an assistant at the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra by and was later appointed conductor of the Poznan´ Philharmonic, collaborated with the Warsaw Grand Theatre, and from 1974 to 1977 was artistic director of the , before his appointment as director of the Polish Radio and Television Orchestra and in Kraków, from 1977 to 1983. From 1983 to 2000 he was managing and artistic director of the National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, and from 1987 to 1992 he was the chief conductor and then first guest conductor of Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran Canaria. In 2002 he became managing and artistic director of the Warsaw Philharmonic SCHUMANN Orchestra. His international career has brought engagements with major orchestras throughout , the Americas and the Near and Far East. He has made over 180 records, including an acclaimed release Scenes from for Naxos of the piano concertos of Prokofiev, awarded the Diapason d’Or and Grand Prix du Disque de la Nouvelle Académie du Disque. In Photo: Krzysztof Niesporek January 2002 his recording of the Turangalîla Symphony by Olivier Goethe’s Faust Messiaen (8.554478-79) was awarded the Cannes Classical Award in Midem Classic 2002. In 2004 he received the Classical Internet Award. He has completed for Naxos a CD series of Szymanowski’s symphonic and large-scale vocal-instrumental works, each rated among ‘discs of the month’ by CD magazines (Gramophone, BBC Music Magazine). He also received the Record Academy Award 2005 of Japanese music magazine Record Geijutsu for Penderecki’s Polish (Naxos), and four Fryderyk Awards of the Polish Phonographic Academy. He has received six GRAMMY® nominations for Penderecki’s St Luke Passion – 2004 (8.557149), A – 2005 (8.557386-87), Seven Gates of Jerusalem – 2007 (8.557766), – 2009 (8.572031) and Karol Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater – 2008 (8.570724) and Symphonies Nos. 1 and 4 – 2009 (8.570722). In 2010 Antoni Wit won the annual award of the Karol Szymanowski Foundation for his promotion of the music of Szymanowski in Soloists his Naxos recordings. Antoni Wit is professor at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw. Warsaw Boys’ Choir Warsaw Philharmonic Choir and Orchestra

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Robert Henryk Wojnarowski SCHUMANN Henryk Wojnarowski has been director of the Warsaw Philharmonic Choir since 1978. He (1810-1856) graduated in orchestral and operatic conducting after studies with Stanisław Wisłocki at the State Higher School of Music in Warsaw. From 1960 to 1978 he was conductor and director of Scenes from Goethe’s Faust, WoO 3 the Grand Theatre Choir in Warsaw (now University of Music). In the Grand Theatre, he prepared about eighty new productions, including several world premières. With the Warsaw Sorge, Engel, Magna Peccatrix ...... Iwona Hossa ( I) Philharmonic Choir, he has for many years given highly successful performances with leading Polish and other European symphony orchestras in such prestigious musical centres as Milan’s Gretchen, Una Poenitentium, Not ...... Christiane Libor (Soprano II) (1985, 1989, 1990), Berlin, Munich, Paris, Rome, Madrid, Brussels, and Jerusalem. Mulier Samaritana, Mangel ...... Anna Luban´ska ( I) In his career he has collaborated with the most distinguished contemporary conductors. Marthe, Maria Aegyptiaca, Schuld, Mater Gloriosa . . Ewa Marciniec (Alto II) Ariel, Pater Ecstaticus ...... Daniel Kirch () Faust, Doctor Marianus, Pater Seraphicus . . . Jaakko Kortekangas (Baritone) Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra – The National Orchestra of Mephistopheles, Böser Geist, Pater Profundus . . . . . Andrew Gangestad () Lemuren / Selige Knaben ...... Warsaw Boys’ Choir The first performance of the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra took place on 5th November 1901 in the newly opened Philharmonic Hall under the Büßerinnen ...... Women of the Warsaw Philharmonic Choir artistic director and principal conductor, Emil Młynarski, with the world- Chor / Chorus Mysticus ...... Warsaw Philharmonic Choir renowned pianist, composer and future statesman Ignacy Jan Paderewski as soloist in a programme that included Paderewski’s Piano Concerto in A Soloists from the Warsaw Philharmonic Choir: minor and works of other Polish composers, Chopin, Moniuszko, Noskowski, Stojowski and Z· elen´ski. The orchestra achieved considerable ł Anna Fija kowska (Part III No. 6) success until the outbreak of war in 1939, with the destruction of the Justyna Jedynak-Obłoza (Part III No. 6) Philharmonic Hall and the loss of 39 of its 71 players. Resuming activity Jolanta Kaczyn´ska-Lechnio (Part II No. 4, Part III No. 6) after the war, the orchestra was conducted by Straszyn´ski and Panufnik, and Sylwia Sikorska (Part II No. 4, Part III No. 6) in January 1950 Witold Rowicki was appointed director and principal conductor, organizing a new ensemble under difficult conditions. In 1955 the rebuilt Philharmonic Hall was re- Magdalena Ziaja (Part II No. 4, Part III No. 6) opened, with a large hall of over a thousand seats and a hall for chamber music, recognised as the National Krzysztof Chalimoniuk (Part II No. 4, Part III No. 4) Philharmonic of Poland. Subsequent conductors included Bohdan Wodiczko, Arnold Rezler and Stanisław Mariusz Cyciura (Part II No. 4, Part III No. 4) Skrowaczewski, and in 1958 Witold Rowicki was again appointed artistic director and principal conductor, a post Tomasz Warmijak (Part II No. 4) he held until 1977, when he was succeeded by Kazimierz Kord, serving until the end of the centenary celebrations in 2001. In 2002 Antoni Wit became general and artistic director of the Warsaw Philharmonic – The National Warsaw Boys’ Choir Orchestra and Choir of Poland. The orchestra has toured widely abroad (Europe, both Americas, Japan, Australia), in addition to its busy schedule at home in symphony concerts, chamber concerts, educational work and other (Choirmaster: Krzysztof Kusiel-Moroz) activities. It now has a complement of 110 players. Recordings include works by Polish composers, Paderewski, Wieniawski, Karłowicz, Szymanowski, Penderecki and Kilar, and by foreign composers, with acclaimed Warsaw Philharmonic Choir and Orchestra interpretations of works by Mahler and Richard Strauss. Their releases have won many prestigious awards, (Choirmaster: Henryk Wojnarowski) including six GRAMMY® nominations. Antoni Wit 8.572430-31 2 11 8.572430-31 572430-31 bk Schumann 7/12/10 12:55 Page 10

Warsaw Boys’ Choir CD 1 73:06 CD 2 43:36 Artistic Director: Krzysztof Kusiel-Moroz 1 Ouverture 7:50 Dritte Abteilung • Part III The Warsaw Boys’ Choir was established in 1990 at the suggestion of Professor Andrzej Chorosin´ski, the then Rector of the Warsaw Fryderyk Erste Abteilung • Part I VII. Fausts Verklärung (Faust’s Transfiguration) Chopin Academy of Music. The founder, artistic director and conductor of the choir is Krzysztof Kusiel-Moroz. In 1998 the Men’s Choir was 2 I. Szene im Garten (Scene in the Garden) 5:29 1 “Waldung, sie schwankt heran” 3:07 established, composed of former members of the Boys’ Choir, currently “Du kanntest mich, o kleiner Engel” (Chor) students of high schools and universities. The Warsaw Boys’ and Men’s (Faust, Gretchen, Mephistopheles, Marthe) Choir gives approximately thirty concerts a year in Poland and abroad, with 2 “Ewiger Wonnebrand” 1:59 a broad repertoire ranging from the medieval to the contemporary. The choir 3 II. Gretchen vor dem Bild der Mater Dolorosa (Pater Ecstaticus) has worked with conductors including Antoni Wit, Kazimierz Kord, (Gretchen before the picture of the Mater Grzegorz Nowak, Jacek Kaspszyk, Yoav Talmi, Jerzy Semkow and Philippe Dolorosa) 4:48 3 “Wie Felsenabgrund mir zu Füßen” 5:57 Herreweghe, and with Krzysztof Penderecki, whose Passion, Utrenja and “Ach neige, du Schmerzenreiche” (Pater Profundus, Pater Seraphicus, Selige Knaben) remain a part of choir’s repertoire. There have been a number of international tours, collaboration with (Gretchen) leading music institutions in Poland and many recordings. 4 “Gerettet ist das edle Glied” 10:57 4 III. Szene im Dom (Scene in the Cathedral) 7:17 (Engel, Selige Knaben, Chor) “Wie anders, Gretchen, war dir’s” Warsaw Philharmonic Choir (Böser Geist, Gretchen, Chor) 5 “Hier ist die Aussicht frei” 4:29 (Doctor Marianus) The Warsaw Philharmonic Choir was founded in 1952 by Zbigniew Soja and Zweite Abteilung • Part II gave its first concert in May 1953 under the then artistic director of the 6 “Dir, der Unberührbaren” 8:37 Warsaw Philharmonic Witold Rowicki. The present choirmaster Henryk 5 IV. Sonnenaufgang (Sunrise) 18:44 (Doctor Marianus, Chor, Büßerinnen, Magna Wojnarowski has held this position since 1978. In its wide repertoire the choir “Die ihr dies Haupt umschwebt im luft’gen Kreise” Peccatrix, Mulier Samaritana, Maria Aegyptiaca, has more than 150 oratorios and choral works, ranging from the Middle Ages (Ariel, Chor, Faust) Una Poenitentium, Selige Knaben, Gretchen, to contemporary music. Each year the choir collaborates in some ten Mater Gloriosa) symphony and oratorio concerts with the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra. 6 V. Mitternacht (Midnight) 13:47 These concerts constitute the most important part of its artistic activity. The “Ich heiße der Mangel” 7 “Alles Vergängliche ist nur ein Gleichnis” 8:30 choir also performs regularly at the Warsaw Autumn Festival and in Wrocław (Mangel, Schuld, Sorge, Not, Faust) (Chorus Mysticus, SSATB*) at the Wratislavia Cantans Festival. Polish music, in particular works of Krzysztof Penderecki, Henryk Mikołaj Górecki and Wojciech Kilar, is a very 7 VI. Fausts Tod (Faust’s Death) 15:10 * Sung by Iwona Hossa (Soprano), Christiane Libor important part of the choir’s repertoire. The choir has performed all Penderecki’s oratorios and a cappella works, the “Herbei, herbei! Herein, herein!” (Soprano), Anna Luban´ska (Alto), Daniel Kirch (Tenor) Polish Requiem, Passio secundum Lucam, Te Deum, Utrenja, Psalms of David, , Veni Creator, Cheruwimska (Mephistopheles, Lemuren, Faust, Chor) and Andrew Gangestad (Bass) Piesn, St Luke Passion, Seven Gates of Jerusalem, and Credo, as well as his Paradise Lost. The choir performs not only in Warsaw but also in other Polish cities, and is also very active internationally, with appearances throughout Europe, as well as in Israel and in Turkey. In addition to performances with leading orchestras, the choir has participated in opera at La Scala, Milan, in Venice, and elsewhere. In 1988 and 1990 the choir was invited to the Vatican to take part in the celebrations of the successive anniversaries of Pope John Paul II’s pontificate, with concerts televised throughout Europe. In December 2001 the Choir together with the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra performed for John Paul II once again in a special concert commemorating the centenary of the Warsaw Philharmonic, this time presenting the Missa pro pace by Wojciech Kilar. In 2009 the choir recorded the only complete version of Moniuszko’s Seven Masses, awarded the Polish Fryderyk and French Orphées d’Or. 8.572430-31 10 3 8.572430-31 572430-31 bk Schumann 7/12/10 12:55 Page 4

Robert Schumann (1810-1856) Daniel Kirch Scenes from Goethe’s Faust, WoO 3 The lyric tenor Daniel Kirch was born in Cologne. He studied acting, singing, dancing and directing, and from 1994 Robert Schumann is in many ways typical of the age in able to marry Clara, after her father’s legal attempts to was a student at the Hochschule für Musik in Cologne in the class of Hans Sotin. In 1996 he was among the which he lived, combining in his music a number of the oppose the match had finally failed. The couple married winnners of the VDMK Bundeswettbewerb Gesang Berlin. As a result of this success he has been invited for principal characteristics of Romanticism, as he did in his in September, remaining first in Leipzig, although concerts and recitals as well as broadcasts by the WDR, NDR and MDR. In the 1997/98 season he became a life. Born in Zwickau in 1810, the son of a bookseller, journeys took place for concert appearances by Clara, member of the Komische Oper Berlin, with which he retains a guest artist contract, while undertaking a wide range publisher and writer, he showed an early interest in generally accompanied by her husband, whose position of operatic rôles and concert engagements throughout Europe. literature and was to make a name for himself in later was of lesser distinction. In 1844 they moved to years as a writer and as editor of the Neue Zeitschrift für Dresden, where it seemed that Schumann might recover Musik, a journal launched in 1834. His father had from the bouts of depression that he had suffered in the Jaakko Kortekangas encouraged his literary and musical interests and had at earlier days of marriage. Here again no official position one time thought of sending him to study with Weber, a seemed to offer itself and it was only in 1849 that the Jaakko Kortekangas was 23 when, having studied with Matti Lehtinen at the Sibelius Academy, he set off for the proposal that was abandoned with the death of the latter, prospect of employment arose, this time in Düsseldorf, International Opera Studio in Zurich. He has appeared in most European countries, the United States and the Far closely followed by the death of Schumann’s father. where Schumann took up his position as director of East. Before returning to Finland in 1999 and becoming a freelancer, he spent ten years as a member of the Freiburg Schumann’s career now followed a more music in 1850. Mendelssohn had enjoyed an uneasy Opera ensemble in Germany. In addition to the German opera houses he has sung at the in Copenhagen, conventional course. In 1828 he entered the University relationship with the Düsseldorf authorities, and Genoa, , Zurich and elsewhere. Winner of the Lappeenranta Singing Competition in 1989, Kortekangas of Leipzig, where his attention to his studies was as Schumann, much less skilled in administration and has also been heard regularly in Finland, at the Finnish National Opera, on the Finnish radio and television, and as intermittent as it was to be the following year at conducting, proved even less able to cope with the the soloist with many orchestras. He has made numerous radio and commercial recordings and sung in such Heidelberg. He was eventually able to persuade his difficulties that arose. The pressures on him led to a televised operas as Einojuhani Rautavaara’s The Gift of the Magi and Kurt Weill’s Mahagonny. He has a repertoire mother and guardian that he should be allowed to study complete nervous break-down in 1853 and final years of over eighty rôles. music under the well-known piano teacher Friedrich spent in an asylum at Endenich, where he died in 1856. Wieck, whose energies had been directed with some Goethe, it need hardly be said, holds a pre-eminent intensity towards the training of his own daughter Clara, position in German literature. The subject of Faust had Andrew Gangestad a pianist of prodigious early talent. Schumann’s always occupied him, from the puppet shows he had ambitions as a pianist, however, were frustrated by a seen as a child to the end of his life. The first part of his The bass Andrew Gangestad was the winner of the 2005 Fritz and Lavinia Jensen Foundation Voice Competition weakness in the fingers, whatever its true cause, and his verse tragedy, more or less complete by 1801, was and the recipient of the Robert Lauch Memorial Grant from the Wagner Society of New York. He made his début at other musical studies had, at the very least, lacked published in 1808; the second part was published in the in 2000-01 in Alban Berg’s Lulu, and has returned each season, appearing as Truffaldino in application. Nevertheless in the 1830s he wrote a great 1832, after his death in that year, an event that, Ariadne auf Naxos, Count Ceprano in , Lignière in the company première of Cyrano de Bergerac, Trojan deal of music for the piano, often in the form of shorter, according to Heine, was also the death of the old Bass in Idomeneo, Vaudemont in I vespri siciliani, Cappadocian in Salome, the Commissioner in Madama Butterfly, genre pieces, with some extra-musical literary or Germany. Goethe’s work and the obvious symbolism of Javelinot in Dialogues des Carmélites, Timur in Turandot, and the Forester in Don Carlo. He made his début with autobiographical association. There was an affair with the figure of Faust, in a period that saw the artist as a the Boston Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of James Levine, singing Brander in La Damnation de Faust in one of Wieck’s pupils, later broken off, but by 1835 he heroic rebel against convention, exercised continuing Boston and at Carnegie Hall, a rôle which he repeated at the Beethoven Festival in Warsaw. had begun to turn his attention to Clara Wieck, nine fascination over composers in the nineteenth century, an years his junior. Wieck had good reason to object to the interest reflected in La damnation de Faust of Berlioz, liaison. His daughter had a career before her as a concert Liszt’s Faust-Symphony and the operas by Spohr and performer and Schumann had shown signs of instability Gounod, as elsewhere then and in the following years. of character, whatever his abilities as a composer might For Schumann the setting of scenes from Goethe’s be. Matters were taken to an extreme when resort was Faust offered what he saw as a formidable challenge. had to litigation, in order to prevent what Wieck saw as He had soon rejected any idea of adapting the great text a disastrous marriage. to form the libretto of an opera. Instead he made a very It was not until 1840 that Schumann was eventually personal choice of excerpts, generally avoiding the 8.572430-31 49 8.572430-31 572430-31 bk Schumann 7/12/10 12:55 Page 8

Anna Luban´ska setting of any songs and, in general, the use of the more salts, faints, as the choir continues, seemingly with overtly popular elements that are included in Part I of greater urgency. The mezzo-soprano Ann Luban´ska completed with distiction her vocal studies at the Warsaw Music Academy with the play, Goethe’s ‘little world’. His attention was Part II of Faust, unlike Part I of Goethe’s work, is Krystyna Szostek-Radkowa in 1994. She was placed first in the International Ada Sari Vocal Competition in Nowy concentrated rather on Part II, Goethe’s ‘great world’, divided into five acts. Part I had ended with Gretchen’s Sàcz, and honoured as the best performer of French Songs and works by Mozart and Lutosławski in 1993. She also and in particular the finale scene of Faust’s redemption rejection of Faust, as he tries to save her from the prison, triumphed in other competitions in Paris and Brussels. Since 1993 she has been a soloist at the National Opera in and purification. He tackled his task intermittently over where she awaits execution for infanticide, and a voice Warsaw where her rôles have included those of Jadwiga in Moniuszko’s Straszny Dwór, Suzuki in Madama some ten years, a period interrupted by bouts of nervous declaring her redemption. The second part of Butterfly, Eboli in Don Carlos, Olga in Eugene Onegin, and Mother Ubu in Penderecki’s . She has depression. His first sketches were made in 1844, when Schumann’s setting takes one scene from Act I, Sunrise, collaborated with Warsaw Chamber Opera performing the part of Marcellina in Le nozze di Figaro, and in Opera he set the final scene of Faust. He returned to work on and two from Act V. In a pleasant landscape Faust lies, Âlàska in Bytom. She has given many performances in Poland and abroad. Her repertoire includes works such as this in 1847, and wrote another version of the last tired and longing for sleep, in the half light. He is Mozart’s Requiem, Verdi’s Requiem, Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater and settings by Rossini, Vivaldi, Szymanowski, and Chorus Mysticus. In 1849 he turned his attention to the surrounded by a ring of spirits and Ariel sings to him, Dvorák, Beethoven’s Choral Symphony, Bach’s Mass in B minor and Passions, and Mozart’s Mass in C minor and three scenes from Part I of the play, the Gretchen with words taken from Goethe’s longer song. A choir Coronation Mass. Her recordings include special archive recordings for Polish Radio. episodes that came to form Schumann’s first part, and continues, singing partly antiphonally, one group composed the scene that begins his second part, echoing another. Ariel resumes his song, as the sun Sonnenaufgang (Sunrise), the opening of Part II of rises. Faust wakes, revived by the beauty of the place. Ewa Marciniec Goethe’s work. In 1850 he wrote the other two scenes The second scene is Midnight, from Goethe’s Act V. that make up his second part, Mitternacht (Midnight) Faust and Mephistopheles have solved the financial Ewa Marciniec has participated in important international master-classes and and Fausts Tod (Faust’s Death). The Overture was problems of an extravagant Emperor by issuing paper has been a prizewinner in competitions in Poland and abroad. She has a written in 1853. money. After many events, including the episode with repertoire ranging from the Baroque to the contemporary and has appeared with The first of the three parts of Schumann’s work Helen of Troy, Faust is rewarded for his service of the leading orchestras in Poland as well as Berlin, Saarbrücken, Belgium, contains the only three scenes taken from Part I of Emperor in securing the defeat of the latter’s enemy by Switzerland, Italy, Denmark, The Netherlands, France and Israel. She has Goethe’s work. These start with the scene in the garden the grant of his own fiefdom, land to be reclaimed from appeared in opera with the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma, Teatro Comunale di of Gretchen’s neighbour Marthe in which Faust, the sea and for the full possession of which he has the Bologna, Teatro Comunale Giuseppe Verdi di Trieste, and in Germany with rejuvenated for his search for knowledge and aged Philemon and Baucis murdered, their house burnt Oper Frankfurt and Staatstheater Oldenburg, and in Austria at the Landestheater experience, woos Gretchen, finally interrupted by the down. Schumann’s chosen scene sees four grey old Linz. She has been a guest at a number of major international festivals and devil and tempter Mephistopheles, who tells him they women enter, Want, Guilt, Need and Care, figures who collaborated with a number of leading conductors. must go. The words set are taken largely from the scene seem to suggest Shakespeare’s witches in Macbeth. The in Marthe’s garden, the first love scene between Faust last of these four makes her way into the palace, through and Gretchen, followed by the end of the following brief the key-hole. Faust has heard the word Need (Not) scene in Marthe’s summerhouse. The second scene is which chimes with Death (Tod) and is now confronted before the statue of the Mater Dolorosa, set in a niche in by Care (Sorge), whose words he rejects. She breathes the city ramparts. Gretchen places flowers before the on him and he is blinded, but light still shines within, in figure and kneels in penitence, having yielded to Faust’s his mind. He bids his people set to the work he has entreaties. The third scene is in the Cathedral. ordered, with spade and shovel. The final scene of Gretchen’s brother Valentin has been killed in a brawl Schumann’s second part is set in the great outer court of with Faust, and dies accusing her of immorality, and the palace, by torch-light. Here Mephistopheles now Gretchen, having caused her mother’s death by summons the Lemures, maleficent spirits of the dead, giving her a supposed sleeping draught, at Faust’s sung by boys’ voices, telling them to dig a grave. Faust, prompting, is tempted by the Evil Spirit to despair, as an old man again, gropes his way out of the palace, the choir is heard singing the Dies irae. The words Quid hearing the sound of their work and imagining that his sum miser tunc dicturus (What shall I, poor wretch, then men are building locks and dykes, to drain the land of say?) are repeated, and Gretchen, calling for smelling his demesne. Taking delight in this, his highest moment, 8.572430-31 85 8.572430-31 572430-31 bk Schumann 7/12/10 12:55 Page 6

he sinks back into the arms of the Lemures, who lay him immortal remains, as it were a soul’s chrysalis. In the Iwona Hossa on the ground. Mephistopheles comments on Faust’s highest, purest region Doctor Marianus, in a baritone endless search, now seeing this greybeard lying on the solo, sings of the Queen of Heaven, to whom a chorus of Polish soprano Iwona Hossa graduated in 1998 at the Ignacy Jan Paderewski sand. He declares that all is now accomplished (Es ist penitent women make their pleas, joined by Magna Academy of Music in Poznan´ as a pupil of Ewa Wdowicka. She has won many vollbracht). Peccatrix (Great Sinner), the Samaritan woman and prizes, including the Grand Prix and Gold Medal at the Maria Callas The third and major part of Schumann’s work is Mary of Egypt and leading to the prayers of a penitent, International Singing Competition in Athens and the Mozart Special Prize at the Faust’s Transfiguration. The scene is set amid mountain once called Gretchen, helped by the Mater Gloriosa. Ada Sari International Vocal Competition in Nowy Sàcz. She was also a finalist gorges, forest, cliffs and wilderness. Holy anchorites, The work ends with a final chorus, set for two of the Francisco Viñas International Vocal Competition in Barcelona, the living amid the rocks on the mountainside, describe the and soloists, for which Schumann provided a second International Mozart Competition in Salzburg, and the Orfeo 2000 International place, their voices echoing. Pater Ecstaticus, floating version, Alles Vergängliche ist nur ein Gleichnis (All Vocal Competition in Hanover. She has taken part in many vocal master-classes, above and below, calls on the ecstasy of divine love in a that is transient is only a parable) and the closing lines: including those by Helena Lazarska, Leopold Spitzer, Ewa Podles, Sylwia tenor solo, followed by the bass, Pater Profundus, in the Das Ewig-Weibliche zieht uns hinan (The eternal Geszty and Ryszard Karczykowski. In 1996 she made her début as Violetta in depths, calling for the holy fire to bring light to his feminine leads us above). La traviata at the State Opera in Poznan´, and since 2000 has been a soloist at the heart. Pater Seraphicus, a baritone solo, from the middle Schumann never heard a performance of all his National Opera in Warsaw. Her repertoire there includes leading rôles in region, welcomes a choir of holy boys, taking them into Szenen aus Goethes Faust, the third part of which had Moniuszko’s operas, recorded also for EMI, Rosina in Il barbiere di Siviglia, his own spirit as they soar higher, in joy. Angels, been performed at the Goethe centenary celebrations of Philippe in Penderecki’s The Devils of Loudun, Norina in Don Pasquale, hovering above in the higher sphere, bear all that is 1849 in Dresden, Leipzig and Weimar. The whole work Konstanze in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Donna Anna in Don Giovanni, the immortal of Faust, triumphantly declaring him saved. was first given in 1862 in Cologne, six years after title rôle in Aida, and Roxana in King Roger. She has taken part in several opera Younger angels bring flowers and more perfect angels Schumann’s death. festivals, including Carcassone, Wexford and Pesaro, and has an extensive carry the remains of Faust. The younger angels feel a repertoire in oratorio and chamber music. In 2004 she received the Andrzej spirit near and see the blest boys, who receive Faust’s Keith Anderson Hiolski Award for the best female rôle at the National Opera in Warsaw. Iwona Hossa has worked with conductors including Krzysztof Penderecki, Stanisław Skrowaczewski, Jacek Kaspszyk, Kazimierz Kord, Jerzy Maksymiuk, Antoni Wit, Gabriel Chmura, Maurizio Benini, David Jones, and David Agler.

Christiane Libor

Christiane Libor was born in Berlin, where she received her first lessons in piano and singing. Until 1996 she studied at the Musikhochschule für Musik Hans Eisler and completed her additional concert course of study in 1999. In 1997 she attended classes in Lieder interpretation with Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Júlia Várady, and also attended master-classes with Edith Mathis, Hans Hotter, Peter Schreier and Joseph Protschka. In 1998 she received the O.E. Hasse-Prize of the Berlin Academy of the Arts and was prize-winner of the 1999 VII. International Mozart- Competition in Salzburg. Her career has continued with leading rôles in major opera houses and concert appearances throughout Europe.

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