© Protected - Classical Music in Poland and the Europe of Chopin - Reviewer's Notebook

  Benjamin Britten The Sorcerer's Apprentice-Accompanist Graham Johnson I found this wonderful monologue to be a remarkably detailed, engaging, humorous yet profoundly affecting 'tribute composition' to Benjamin Britten by the composer, advisor, accompanist and music copyist Graham Johnson. He worked with Britten and Pears in close collaboration all his life, devoting much of it to the selfless dissemination of the composer's poignant songs, dramatic operas and orchestral music to the wider world.  Strangely in my twenties I had fully embraced the so-called avant garde (how odd this term now) as a writer and attended Stockhausen’s New Music courses as an observer in Darmstadt in the late 1960s. It had as deep a musical effect on me, this close contact with the composer, as upon Johnson who highlighted such importance in his tribute. This intimate and self-effacing address to us is an extraordinarily 'musical' assembly of the personal experience of love an...

Krzysztof Penderecki and the conductor Jacek Kasprzyk Today is a celebration of the birth of the great Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki I can unfortunately only poorly imagine the sublime work he might have dedicated to the horrors perpetrated at present in Ukraine and the Middle East given his profound feelings concerning Hiroshima. Well, his memory and more importantly, his monumental musical legacy, remains with us. As he has now joined the grand pantheon of Chopin, Szymanowski, Paderewski and Lutoslawski.   The present Krzysztof Penderecki Festival will be held on November 22–26, 2023 in Warsaw. During three concerts at the National Philharmonic, you will hear primarily the music of the festival's patron, but also of other outstanding composers: Witold Lutosławski, Wałentyn Sylwestrow, Henryk Mikołaj Górecki. On Thursday, November 23, the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Andrzej Boreyko, will perform together with one of the most outstanding violinists, Anne-Soph...