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Łódź | Kevin Kenner's Piano Recital on the National Independence Day

On 11 November 2019 at 7:00 p.m. the Artur Rubinstein Philharmonic in Łódź will host a master recital of world-famous pianist Kevin Kenner.

The American pianist Kevin Kenner, winner of the Chopin Competition in 1990, has many connections with Poland. The artist often participates in the Warsaw festival "Chopin and his Europe". In 2010 he gave concerts in our country on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Fryderyk Chopin. He is a juror of the International Chopin Piano Competition and a visiting professor at the Grażyna and Kiejstut Bacewicz Academy of Music in Łódź. Last year, he received an honorary doctorate from this university. As a soloist, Kenner toured with such excellent orchestras as the BBC Symphony, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester or the Orchestra of the 18th Century. He performed under the baton of Sir Charles Groves, Andrew Davis, Jacek Kaspszyk and others.

During the upcoming recital, Kevin Kenner will perform piano compositions by Fryderyk Chopin and Ignacy Jan Paderewski, which he recorded on the highly-acclaimed albums.

Full programme available at: https://filharmonia.lodz.pl/

Opole | National Independence Day Gala Concert

A symphony concert on the occasion of the National Independence Day will take place on 11 November 2019 at 6 p.m. at the Józef Elsner Opole Philharmonic.

Every year the Opole Philharmonic celebrates the National Independence Day with a symphony concert. The repertoire of the upcoming event with the participation of the Opole Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Przemysław Neumann and violinist Mariusz Patyra, consists entirely of Polish works. The evening will begin with a symphonic poem A Legend, Op. 31 by Witold Maliszewski, which tells the story of Boruta – a nobleman who became the devil. Then we will listen to the etremely diffucult Violin Concerto No. 1 in F minor, Op. 14 by Henryk Wieniawski and the monumental Symphony in D minor, Op. 21 by Zygmunt Stojowski.

Full programme available at: https://filharmonia.opole.pl/

Krasnystaw | Elżbieta Stefańska's harpsichord recital on 11 November

Local authorities of the city and poviat of Krasnystaw invite you to a harpsichord recital by Elżbieta Stefańska entitled "The history of one letter". The event will take place on 11 November 2019 at 5 p.m. in the Krasnystaw Culture Centre on the occasion of the closing of the 100th Anniversary of Regaining Independence.

The recital commemorates the letter sent from Krakow on 11 November 1949 by the world-famous pianist Halina Czerny-Stefańska to the director of the Mieczysław Karłowicz Krasnystaw Social Music Centre Ignacy Lipczyński. In the letter the pianist expressed her gratitude for the praise she had received for winning the 4th International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw. It is worth recalling that the Mieczysław Krałowicz Music Centre in Krasnystaw had twenty brancher in nearby towns and educated nearly 3,000 students, many of whom have graduated from music academies.

The programme will include compositions by J.J. Froberger, G.F. Handel, F. Couperin, C.B. Balbastre, C.F.E. Bach, M.K. Ogiński, and P.A. Soler. The recital will also premiere Mariusz Dubaj's polonaise Welcome to the Fatherland commissioned by Elżbieta Stefańska. The concert will be hosted by the president of the Lublin Branch of the Polish Composers' Union.

Warsaw | Premiere of the multimedia composition "Mi-repris"

The name of the new project by Cezary Duchnowski, Paweł Hendrich and Marcin Rupociński, which will be presented at the New Theater on 11 November 2019 at 7 p.m., refers to Mi-parti – the electroacoustic composition planned by Witold Lutosławski.

Around the year 1960, Witold Lutosławski was considering what was at the time an avant garde notion of composing electronic music, traces of which are unknown notes the composer left behind, now stored in the Paul Sacher Archive in Basel. These materials are the foundation for the Mi-repris project, in which the composers present a new electro-acoustic work based on those stored sketches, in line with the spirit, aesthetics and technological facilities of the age when the initial concept was created. They will then create a form of expression which will transfer the sketches of an unfinished electro-acoustic composition to contemporaneity, be based on technological solutions not previously available to Lutosławski.

The work was created thanks to the "Composing Commissions" programme implemented by the Institute of Music and Dance. Its premiere will take place as part of the "New Music Stage" series organized at the New Theatre by the Witold Lutosławski Society.

Information on tickets at: https://nowyteatr.org/pl/kalendarz/mi-repris

Bydgoszcz | Inauguration of the 11th International Paderewski Piano Competition

Ignacy Jan Paderewski Society in Bydgoszcz invites you on 10 November 2019 at 5 p.m. to the Pomeranian Philharmonic for the inaugural concert of the 11th International Paderewski Piano Competition.

The concert will feature Nikita Mndoyants – Russian piano virtuoso, the undisputed winner of the 7th Paderewski Piano Competition in Bydgoszcz (2007), the winner of the Cleveland Piano Competition (2016) and the finalist of the Van Cliburn Piano Competition (2013). Mndoyants is also successful as a composer: in 2014 he received the first prize in the N. Miaskowski Composition Competition in Moscow, and in 2016 at the S. Prokofiew Composition Competition in Sochi. Mndoyants graduated from the Moscow Conservatory, where he also studied composition. Since 2013, he teaches orchestration at his alma mater.

The pianist will peform Sergei Prokofiev's Second Piano Concerto in G minor, considered the most difficult of all the composer's piano concertos. This wonderful work is characterized as extremely emotional and intense, being also a technical challenge for the soloist. The programme will also include Witold Lutosławski's Concerto for Orchestra, which is his most-performed piece to this day. The symphony orchestra will be conducted by the artistic director of Pomeranian Philharmonic, Kai Bumann. The concert will be hosted by Krzysztof Zanussi – outstanding film and television director, screenwriter and producer, sometimes referred to as "the spiritual father of Polish cinema".

More information at: http://www.filharmonia.bydgoszcz.pl/

Warsaw | 2nd Suite of the Nations of Europe

The performance of the 2nd Suite of the Nations of Europe will take place during the Final Gala of the 3rd European Festival of Music Academies on 10 November 2019 at 8 p.m. at the Boss Conference and Training Center (20 Żwanowiecka Street, Warsaw).

Suite of the Nations of Europe No. 2 is a work written by six composers from various European countries. The authors of the work are: Marcin Kopczyński (Poland), Jonas Jurkūnas (Lithuania), Balázs Kecskés D. (Hungary), Victor Vojcik (Belarus), Eliska Cílková (Czech Republic), Kirill Volkov (Russia). The project is aimed at facilitating the contact of Polish audience with new music and learning about the work of foreign artists, it also promotes the presentation of new Polish works abroad, while encouraging cooperation with the youngest generation of musicians. The uniqueness of this work lies in its diversity and contribution of composers from various European countries. The second part of the Suite is a vocal-instrumental work with many layers. The combination of instruments is completely arbitrary. Such diversity gives a lot of creative possibilities, while ensuring the consistency of all parts.

3rd European Festival of Music Academies is an international musical meeting and presentation of European music academies which present their artistic achievements by proposing performances by the most talented students, graduates and their teachers during the festival concerts. The organisers of the event are the Subcarpathian Foundation for the Developement of Culture and the Culture Promotion Center in Praga South District of the Capital City of Warsaw with the support of ARKADY Publishing House, Yamaha Music Poland and the Institute of Music and Dance.

More information at: https://efam.interpiano.pl/pol

Lusławice | Concert of Polish and German artists on the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall

On 9 November 2019 at 7 p.m. at the Krzysztof Penderecki European Centre for Music in Lusławice, one of the best European big bands – NDR Bigband – will perform in the company of the Atom String Quartet, soprano Olga Pasiecznik and pianist Vladislav Sendecki.

Norddeutscher Rundfunk Big Band – the orchestra of the German public radio in Hamburg, is one of the best European jazz big bands. They have performed with such artists as Dexter Gordon, Chet Baker, George Coleman, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Tomasz Stańko, Lionel Hampton, Richard Galliano. The first jazz concert of the orchestra took place in May 1974 in Hamburg's "Fabrik" and since then the band has built its international reputation. NDR Big Band takes part in many special artistic projects that often go beyond the scope of jazz music. The orchestra has been successfully reaching for compositions of Polish jazzmen for several years. Pianist and composer Vladislav Sendecki, a graduate of the Music Academy in Krakow, has been the arranger and soloist of the famous NDR Big Band since 1996. The concert will also feature the Atom String Quartet – one of the best jazz quartets in Poland and soprano Olga Pasiecznik, a soloist of the Polish Royal Opera.

The artists will perform Le Jardin Qublié by Vladyslav Sendecki, My Polish Heart by Wolfgang Kerschek and About Penderecki by Geir Lysne – variations on the works by Krzysztof Penderecki. The concert will be a repetition of the well-received world premiere of the project, which the artists performed on 27 November 2018 at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg.

Media patronage: Polish Music Information Centre POLMIC.

More information at: https://penderecki-center.pl/

Katowice | Grażyna Bacewicz and America(ns)!

The Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra invites you to a concert of the Silesian Quartet from the series "Grażyna Bacewicz and America(ns)!" on 9 November 2019 at 6 p.m. The Silesian musicians together with Wojciech Świtała will presnt a repertoire that is an interesting combination of different styles and aesthetics.

The programme will include the String Quartet No. 4 'Buczak' by American minimalist Philip Glass and the String Quartet No.2 'Grandfather Songs' (in memoriam Henryk Mikołaj Górecki) by Marek Nowakowski – a son of Polish immigrants born in the United States, whose wide and diverse output represents a modern merger of bold expressionism and mystical contemplation, Slavic pathos and American individualism. The 'Grandfather Songs' quartet was premiered in 2011 by the Kronos Quartet during the Polish Music Festival in Krakow.

We will also listen to the Piano Quintet No. 2 (1965) by Grażyna Bacewicz. Although classicall in form (Moderato – Allegro / Larghetto / Allegro giocoso) – it comes from the period when Bacewicz became interested in avant-garde music. "While basing the narrative structure of the work on montage as well as variation techniques, with a selected group of intervals and intervallic structure playing the most important role, the composer has endowed it with a greater degree of lyrical and dramatic quality; (...) the new role of the piano – as opposed to Bacewicz's earlier orchestral works – is decisive here as it is occasionally treated almost as a solo instrument, in a Romantic manner, or cooperates with the remaining instruments in creating colourful sound landscapes," wrote Małgorzata Gąsiorowska in the composer's biography.

More information at: http://www.nospr.org.pl/

Kraków | Multi-percussionist Martin Grubinger and Sinfonietta Cracovia

On 9 November 2019, the ICE Kraków will host the Grand Jubilee Gala celebrating the 25th anniversary of Sinfonietta Cracovia. The star of this special evening from the series "Stars with Sinfonietta" will be the famous virtuoso Martin Grubinger, widely recognized as the most outstanding living multi-percussionist. Together with Sinfonietta Cracovia, he will perform works by John Corigliano and Krzysztof Penderecki under the baton of Jurek Dybał.

Martin Grubinger is a laureate of the Leonard Bernstein Award and the Würth Foundation Award. As a soloist, he performed with such outstanding orchestras as the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra or the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. He was a dedicatee of several compositions by such composers as Friedrich Cerha or Peter Eötvös. Grubinger released his debut album Drums'n'Chant at the prestigious Deutsche Grammophon label; metaphysical songs, meditations and Gregorian chant immersed in the sounds of percussion instruments from around the world aroused the enthusiasm of critics and audiences around the world. The artist's discography for the legendary German label already contains four albums.

During the anniversary edition of the "Stars with Sinfonietta" series, this phenomenal percussionist together with Sinfonietta Cracovia under the baton of Jurek Dybał will perform John Corigliano's Percussion Concerto with a significant title Conjurer – Wizard. The event of the evening will be the Polish premiere of a somewhat enigmatic song, which first and so far only performance took place in 2000 in Hannover: Music for recorders, marimba, percussion and strings by Krzysztof Penderecki, the initiator of Sinfonietta Cracovia.

The evening will end with bravura performances of real hits of classical music: Symphony No. 41 in C major 'Jupiter' by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Symphony No. 1 in D major 'Classical', Op. 25 by Sergei Prokofiev. The concert will be a symbolic culmination of the anniversary celebrations of the 25th artistic season of the Orchestra of the Royal Capital City of Krakow – Sinfonietta Cracovia.