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

I attended the highlighted fascinating, thought-provoking and inspiring papers presented at this prestigious international conference. I cannot of course cover them all in detail but in the fullness of time many will be published in a Polish National Chopin Institute scholarly book. I have given a brief opinion of some of them below. I must say I cannot understand why so few young Polish music students, pianists and  or mature  professors did not attend this conference. It was not a 'dry as dust' or 'Professor Smellfungus' musicological conference but a very exciting intellectual stimulation. The lectures were given by many of the foremost world authorities on the music of Chopin. They had traveled to Warsaw from as far as Australia expressly for this purpose. There is a curious tension and mutual resistance between musicologists and professional performing musicians which I have never understood. Many visionary points could be profitably explored...

  Dmitry Ablogin Haydn + This is the title under which the magnificent Freiburg Baroque Orchestra celebrated the start of its new concert season on October 8th. In the fully occupied Freiburg Concert Hall, the FBO played one of its heartfelt composers: Joseph Haydn's Symphony No. 101 in D major , nicknamed 'The Clock', is on the program, as well as the overture to Haydn's opera 'Armida' , two works that Haydn wrote on his legendary concert tours to London in 1792 and 1794 brought great acclaim. In addition they played music by a composer whom the FBO had completely rediscovered - Haydn's contemporary and protégé Johann Nepomuk Hummel, a child prodigy at the piano, later an acclaimed piano virtuoso and visionary composer.  The FBO performed Hummel's second piano concerto in A minor Op.85 (1816) with the pianist Dmitry Ablogin as soloist. They have a close stylistic connection and share a special and spontaneously creative musical relationship. He chose...

Friends of Chopin Australia A musical and cultural renaissance  is currently flowering between Australia and Poland based on the compositions of Fryderyk Chopin   Join Orava Quartet and pianist Aleksandra Świgut for a performance of Chopin’s Piano Concerto No 1 not to be missed. Consummate artists in their own right, together they will treat us to a performance unlike any you’ve heard before. Rounding out the program with some Chopin works for solo piano, Wojciech Kilar’s Orawa, and Krysztof Penderecki’s 3 rd  String Quartet. I have always felt the performance of the quartet version of the concerto is a remarkable complement to that with the full orchestra. It gives a suitable chamber music feel to the entire work which reveals an intimacy rarely encountered. and  9-10 December 2023 Kyohei Sorita in Recital  Sydney Conservatorium of Music, SYDNEY 9-10 Dec 2023 World-renowned Japanese superstar pianist Kyohei Sorita performs in Sydney for the firs...