Catalogue

When asked to attempt a definition of her music, she called it lyrical expressionism. The choice of this term says much about the emotional intensity of Elżbieta Sikora’s music, which may reflect the experience of her two home countries, Poland and France, but is also a consequence of her artistic maturation in an age when two powerful trends – the avant-garde and neo-Classicism – were vying for the palm. Such a label may also result from the artist’s focus on the listener as her target, whom she invariably attempts to surprise, shock, or bewilder.

The workings of inspiration are truly inscrutable. Karol Szymanowski sought it in the Antiquity, the Orient, and in Polish folklore. The artists of to-day, though cast from a different mould, are in turn inspired by the oeuvre of Szymanowski.

A creative clash of such individualities is always a high-risk venture that might only seem fit for a one-time success. Contrary to expectations, collaboration between one of Poland’s most eminent 21st-century composers and one of the best contemporary writers continues to develop, producing ever more surprising results. The two artists chose the opera as the field for their joint experimentation. They approach this genre in all seriousness but without humility… Which brings us to the title of Nowak and Twardoch’s third work, “Pokora” (‘humility’ in Polish).

When cinema’s great visionary Francis Ford Coppola is calling – the director of The Godfather and Apocalypse Now – who would hang up on him? Wojciech Kilar took up the offer of cooperation, which resulted in his soundtrack (now of cult status) for the tale of the Transylvanian monster whose love was a bit too strong. Years later, this pathetic-lyrical cantata for mixed choir and symphony orchestra has been turned inside out by pianist Piotr Orzechowski and saxophonist Kuba Więcek.

“I’ve focused on chamber music in order to bring out as much colour in the violin itself and its changing sound as possible,” says virtuoso Adam Bałdych about his vision of Wieniawski’s music. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung called Bałdych “technically the most accomplished violinist of our time”. Technical proficiency and thorough education (which includes an honours degree from Katowice’s Academy of Music and a scholarship to Berklee College of Music) do not stop Bałdych from taking an unorthodox approach to the time-honoured music of old masters.

The Stalowa Wola composers, also known as Generation ’51, hold a separate place in Polish contemporary music, one that justly deserves to be remembered. What Aleksander Lasoń, Andrzej Krzanowski, and Eugeniusz Knapik have in common is that they first came to public attention at the 1970s’ ‘Young Musicians for the Young City’ festival in Stalowa Wola, but also that they presented an ambivalent attitude to the avant-garde, drawing on its achievements but avoiding a rigid doctrinaire approach, and they let their music sound at least a note of romanticism.

Emotions related to the Chopin Competition immediately fire the enthusiasm even of those music lovers who in other circumstances would seldom reach for the music of Poland’s most eminent composer. The temperature of the debate naturally reaches its height directly before the jury’s verdict is announced, but it later goes down only very slowly, and the process can take months if not years – luckily so, since these are matters worth arguing about… In the meantime, here comes our 3CD box FRYDERYK CHOPIN – PIANO CONCERTOS / ÉTUDES / CHAMBER WORKS from ANAKLASIS, aiming to reconcile all the parties.

Drach’s element was the earth. With their next joint project, Aleksander Nowak and Szczepan Twardoch pay homage to water, though the true object of their artistic contemplation is the journey as a longing for change and a quest for meaning in life.