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Antoni Wit Rowicki was again appointed artistic director and principal conductor, a post he held until 1977, when he was , one of the most highly regarded Polish conductors, studied conducting succeeded by , serving until the end of the centenary celebrations in 2001. In 2002 Antoni Wit became with Henryk Czyz and composition with at the Academy of general and artistic director of the Philharmonic – The National Orchestra and Choir of . The orchestra Music in Kraków, subsequently continuing his studies with in has toured widely abroad (, both Americas, , Australia), in addition to its busy schedule at home of Mieczysław . He also graduated in law at the in Kraków. Immediately symphony concerts, chamber concerts, educational work and other activities. It now has a complement of 110 players. after completing his studies he was engaged as an assistant at the Warsaw Recordings include works by Polish composers, Paderewski, Wieniawski, Karłowicz, Szymanowski, Penderecki and Philharmonic Orchestra by and was later appointed conductor of the Kilar, and by foreign composers, with acclaimed interpretations of works by Mahler and Richard Strauss. Their KARŁOWICZ Poznan´ Philharmonic, collaborated with the Warsaw Grand Theatre, and from 1974 releases have won many prestigious awards, including six Grammy nominations.

Photo: Krzysztof Niesporek to 1977 was artistic director of the , before his appointment as director of the Polish Radio and Television Orchestra and Choir in Kraków, from 1977 to 1983. From 1983 to 2000 he was managing and artistic director of the Serenade, Op. 2 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 Concerto, Op. 8 Philharmonic Orchestra. His international career has brought engagements with major orchestras throughout Europe, the Americas and the Near and Far East. He has made over 180 records, including an acclaimed release for Naxos of the concertos of Prokofiev, awarded the Diapason d’Or and Grand Prix du Disque de la Nouvelle Académie du Disque. In January 2002 his recording of the Turangalîla Symphony by (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 Gramophone and BBC Music Magazine. He also received the Record Academy Award 2005 of Japanese music magazine Record Geijutsu for Penderecki’s (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 Polish Requiem – 2005 (8.557386-87), Seven Gates of Jerusalem – 2007 (8.557766), Utrenja – 2009 (8.572031) and ’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 his Naxos recordings. Antoni Wit is professor at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw. Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra • The National Philharmonic of Poland The first performance of the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra took place on 5th November 1901 in the newly opened Philharmonic Hall under the artistic director and principal conductor, Emil Młynarski, with the world-renowned pianist, composer and future statesman as soloist in a programme that included Paderewski’s in A minor and works of other Polish composers, Chopin, Moniuszko, Noskowski, Stojowski and C Z˙elen´ski. The orchestra achieved considerable success until the outbreak of war in 1939, with the destruction of the Ilya Kaler, Violin Philharmonic Hall and the loss of 39 of its 71 players. Resuming activity after the war, the orchestra was conducted M by Straszyn´ski and Panufnik, and in January 1950 Witold Rowicki was appointed director and principal conductor, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra organizing a new ensemble under difficult conditions. In 1955 the rebuilt Philharmonic Hall was re-opened, with a large hall of over a thousand seats and a hall for chamber music, recognised as the National Philharmonic of Poland. Y Subsequent conductors included Bohdan Wodiczko, Arnold Rezler and Stanisław Skrowaczewski, and in 1958 Witold Antoni Wit K 5 8.572274 6 8.572274 572274bk Karlowicz:557541bk Kelemen 3+3 24/10/10 1:12 PM Page 2

Mieczysław Karłowicz (1876–1909) The Violin Concerto in A was completed in December hesitantly before drawing on both of the principal themes Ilya Kaler Serenade, Op. 2 • Violin Concerto in A major, Op. 8 1902 and received its first performance in on 21st in an increasingly impulsive development, building to a Ilya Kaler was born in , , into a family of March the following year, together with the Rebirth climax from where the soloist launches a brief but musicians. He attended the Central Music School for Gifted Although he left a mere handful of compositions at the symphonic poems are recorded on Naxos 8.570295, while Symphony. It was written for and dedicated to Polish virtuosic cadenza. The first theme is soon recalled then, Children in Moscow and completed his studies at the Moscow time of his death, in an avalanche while skiing in the Tatra the third, fourth and sixth of the sequence are on virtuoso Stanisław Bacewicz, with whom Karłowicz had after a chorale-like passage for woodwind, the second State Conservatory. His teachers include Victor Tretyakov, Mountains, Mieczysław Karłowicz today ranks high 8.570452]. studied as a violinist during the early 1890s and who may theme returns no less expressively than before, the soloist , Zinaida Gilels and Abram Shtern. Ilya Kaler among the composers who constituted the ‘Young Poland’ As mentioned above, the Serenade in C is Karłowicz’s have encouraged his protégé to turn to composition as the leading the music through to a lively coda that takes in is a Medalist of the Tchaikovsky (1986), Sibelius (1985) generation of musicians and whose most famous figure first orchestral work. Written under the direct supervision best outlet for his talents. Understandable, then, that he elements of both main themes prior to what seems and Paganini (1981) International Violin Competitions. His is Karol Szymanowski. Born into a wealthy academic of Urban, it was given its première by him at a concert of should have accepted the invitation to give the première of intended as a forthright conclusion on brass and strings. concert tours took him all over the world, both in recitals and family at Wiszniew (in what is now Lithuania), he initially student pieces in Berlin on 15th April 1897. Although the concerto, which is as finely conceived and executed for The horns, however, continue with an inward passage that as soloist with major orchestras. He records exclusively for trained as a violinist but, after his arrival in Berlin, where such pieces by Dvorˇák and Tchaikovsky had already its instrument as any by the composer-performers of that actually marks the start of the second movement. Its main Naxos Records, with recordings including works by Paganini, he studied from 1895 to 1901 with Henryk Urban (an achieved considerable popularity, while that by his era. Although Tchaikovsky is a primary influence (albeit theme, announced by the soloist, is a long-limbed and Brahms, Schumann, Dvorˇák, Glazunov, Ysaÿe, Tchaikovsky, ardent admirer of Richard Strauss) as well as having contemporary Josef Suk had been endorsed by no less a less so than with the symphony), the piece is by no means eloquent melody offset by the more headstrong idea that Bach, Taneyev and Szymanowski. He has served as a informal tuition with members from the Philharmonic figure than Brahms, Karłowicz seems rather to have taken derivative in its melodic content and formal thinking; occupies the central section. This in turn provokes a surge concertmaster with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, orchestra, he turned increasingly to composition. Several a serenade by the now little known Robert Volkmann as indeed, the G minor Concerto by Bruch may have given of powerful emotion from the orchestra which dies down and as a guest concertmaster with the San Francisco sets of songs and piano pieces represent his earliest model. Despite this, his work gives notice of an unforced Karłowicz the idea of joining the movements into a to mark the return of the main theme, now allotted to the Symphony and the Philadelphia Orchestra. He has served on published work (further chamber music was almost handling of chromatic harmony within a well-defined continuous sequence. All but forgotten in the wake of the lower woodwind and elegantly decorated by the soloist the faculty of the in Rochester, NY, certainly destroyed during the bombing of Warsaw in tonal trajectory. First World War and then as the twentieth century ran its before the latter takes it up for a warmly expressive held a Distinguished Professorship at Indiana University 1939), but the Serenade for Strings already demonstrates The March opens with a lively introduction that course, the concerto has been rediscovered by a number restatement which, in turn, makes way for the tranquil School of Music in Bloomington, and is currently a Professor no mean grasp of larger musical forms, an ability which features pizzicato, then the main theme is an expressive of violinists over the last decade and can now stand as, if close. After the briefest of pauses, fanfaring brass and of Violin on the faculty of DePaul University School of Music was further consolidated by incidental music for Jozafat idea with opulent harmonies which takes on greater not the most personal, then probably the most immediately strings announce a finale whose main theme is robustly in . Nowinski’s drama The White Dove, the Rebirth Symphony animation as it proceeds. The trio section is slower and attractive of the composer’s orchestral works. stated by the soloist and is complemented by a more whose relatively compact design is overlaid with an stately, its ingratiating manner duly ensuring a smooth The first movement opens with a commanding intro- subdued idea. The first theme now returns, followed by a ambitious conceptual programme, and the Violin transition back to the main theme. After a yearning duction on horns and strings, the soloist entering with a another, more relaxed idea announced by strings. This is Concerto which proved to be his last overtly abstract chordal sequence has set the mood, the Romance centres forthright theme that in turn leads to an animated taken up by the soloist, who then recalls the main theme composition. on a ruminative theme for the lower strings that is orchestral tutti then, following a passionate transition from as part of a dexterous ascent to the climax and a spirited The remainder of Karłowicz’s all too brief career was complemented by more ambivalent asides from the the soloist, a second theme that ranks among its final flourish. spent first in Warsaw, where he was active as first a . These lead into a more restive section, before the composer’s most generous melodic inspirations. A brief member, then director, of the Music Society and the initial theme returns even more richly harmonized than orchestral codetta prepares for a central section that begins Richard Whitehouse leader of its orchestra, then, after further study in before to ensure an ending of rapt serenity. A peremptory with Arthur Nikisch, in , where he pursued his call to attention announces the Waltz, whose main theme other interests of walking, cycling, photography and is suave and sweeping by turns. The central section skiing. His music from these later years consists of a focuses on a humorous interplay of upper and lower series (albeit not intended as such) of six symphonic strings, then a slower transformation of the initial theme poems that evince a strong attraction to the pantheistic itself makes way for the waltz measure and a final spirited and existential tendencies found in such philosophers as caper to the finish. The Finale is the shortest and simplest Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, along with the attributes of the four, its strutting theme complemented by a slower of solitude and an emotional pivoting between fervent and moodier idea which touches on aspects of those from affirmation and stark despair that are a natural corollary earlier movements, but the main theme soon returns to see to such thinking [the first, second and fifth of these the work through to its vigorous close.

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