March 2003 – Polish Music Center

Polish Music Center Newsletter Vol. 9, no. 3

News

“Splendor Of Poland” Exhibit In San Francisco

Leonardo Da Vinci and the splendor of Poland exhibit is scheduled for March 8th to May 18th at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in San Francisco. The exhibit features 78 paintings from the collections of Polish magnates, monarch and museums. With the exception of Leonardo’s “Lady with an Ermine” these paintings are being shown for the first time outside of Poland.Several musical and other events are being planned throughout the two months at various locations (see Calendar). An ongoing art exhibit of various contemporary painters, sculptors and weavers will be shown at the Polish Arts and Culture Foundation at 1750 Clay street. Caria Tomczykowska is president. 415-474-7070.

In addition to lectures, films, folk dance programs, pianists Piotr Anderszewski, Krystian Zimerman and Jan Nakamatsu have been scheduled.

750th Anniversary of St. Stanislaw Canonization in Buffalo

Piotr Gorecki, national choral director of the Polish Singers Alliance of America, will conduct a Cantata which he composed in honor of St. Stanislaw, for mixed chorus of several hundred singers, vocal soloists and orchestra on 20 June, 2003. He wrote the cantata in 1953 when he became organist and choirmaster of the St. Stanislaw church in Buffalo.

The European premiere of this cantata was given in Sep 2001 in Wroclaw, Poland by the Lower Silesian Opera company. The work will be performed in Warsaw and Poznan in August of this year. The cantata is set to a Polish text by Franciszek Lech and tells of the conflict between the bishop of Krakow and the Polish king, who suffered a martyr’s death in 1079.

International Cello Competition In Warsaw

Forty-five cellists from sixteen countries entered the IV Witold Lutosławski International Cello Competition. Finalists: Karol Marianowski (Poland), who had to withdraw because of contussion of the hand; Guillaume Martigne (France); Son Lam Tram (France) and Julian Steckel (Germany). Michal Borzykowski of Poland won for best performance ofGrave and Aleksandra Ohar for best performance of the Sacher Variations.

An Invitation From Ardena2

Arden2 present:
The Staniewski Center for Theater Practice in Gardzienice. Metamorphoses or The Golden Ass, According to Lucius Apuleius

The Getty Center – Harold Williams Auditorium
1200 Getty Center Drive, in Los Angeles
Saturday, March 8th – at 4:00 p.m. and at 8:00 p.m. Tickets are $22 general admission and $15 for students/seniors

Following its mission to help promote international cultural exchange, Arden2 is honored to be coordinating this Spring the visit of the world-renowned Polish theatre company “The Staniewski Center for Theater Practice in Gardzienice.” Mr. Staniewski’s Group will tour the West Coast with their latest production in March 2003. Metamorphoses or The Golden Ass, According to Lucius Apuleius will be performed twice at The Getty Center, on 8 March 2003. This ambitious project to recreate the music of Greek antiquity in this tour de force performance has achieved international acclaim in the past few years. This will be its first West Coast presentation after the successful tour of the East Coast in Spring 2001, which included performances and workshops at La Mama in New York, New York University, Smith College and MIT.

Considering the cultural role of the Getty Center, and Gardzienice?s creative context in the history of anthropological theatre, we are dedicated to organize this very important event as an opportunity to present Polish culture at its best. We hope that this project will stir your interest and enthusiasm and you will consider it beneficial for a cultural enhancement of the Los Angeles community. Gardzienice Company will also visit Yale and Stanford Universities.

The Getty will present two performances in the Harold Williams Auditorium at 1200 Getty Center Drive, in Los Angeles on March 8th – at 4:00 p.m. and at 8:00 p.m. Tickets are $22 general admission and $15 for students/seniors. Seating is assigned so call as early as you can purchase tickets for the best seats at 310/440-7300. Tickets are also available at the Museum Information Desk. Visit www.getty.edu for additional information. To find out more about Gardzienice, please e-mail Arden2 at contact@arden2.org or call ARDEN2 at 310/514-1023. ARDEN2- SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING INTERNATIONAL THEATRE EXCHANGE AND DIALOGUE has offices at 350 East Seventeenth Street Suite 220, Costa Mesa, CA 92627; Tel: 310/514-1023; fax: 949/548-3751; www.arden2.org; e-mail: contact@arden2.org

Paderewski And The American Gilded Age

Paderewski in 1890. Promotional photo from German and American tours.

Maja Trochimczyk presented her study of the connections between Paderewski and the American “Aestheticism” movement initiated in the 1890s at two national conferences, of the American Musicological Society in November 2002 (at Columbus, Ohio) and during the meeting of the Society for American Music in February 2003 at Tempe, Arizona. The paper, entitled, “How Paderewski Plays: Chant d’amour and the Aestheticism of the American Gilded Age” discusses the creation of an “angelic” image of the pianist and its role in establishing the Paderewski cult before World War I. The study emphasized the role of actress Helena Modrzejewska (Modjeska) in the establishing of Paderewski’s “public” image of a golden-haired “archangel” modelled on the imagery from Botticelli, Fra Angelico (according to Modrzejewska’s statements), but actually closer to the angels painted by such pre-Rafaelite artists as Edward Burne-Jones and Lawrence Alma Tadema. Modrzejewska who met Paderewski in 1884, prior to his international successes but after her successful tours of the U.S. and U.K. and prior to her exposure to the Aesthetic ideals, later imported to the U.S. The cult of Paderewski spawned the phenomenon of the “Paderewski girl” – a young independent professional, mostly pianist or piano teacher, who traveled to his recitals with her friends and adored his looks and his message of love and spirituality. His choice of the recital format, publicity materials (including an overreliance on the 1890 portrait by Burne-Jones presenting him as an “archangel”), and repertoire including numerous love-themed compositions, served to feed the enthusiasm of his female admirers and often disregarded the opinion of the male music critics.

Paderewski’s appeal to women during his early American tours was strengthened by his choice of music such as Zygmunt Stojowski’s Chant d’amour that was his favorite encore since 1907 and that was performed over 80 times by the virtuoso. The music’s elegant sentimentality contributed to the cult of the virtuoso as embodiment of love and beauty, cherished by his female public and by artists who constructed his “otherworldly” image. Stojowski compositions, including another encore, By the Brookside, belonged to the aestheticism movement, also exemplified by paintings by Thomas W. Dewing – featuring lonely women engaged in performing or contemplating music. Dewing and Paderewski shared more than inspiration with Burne-Jones, for both belonged to the “Gilder circle” in New York. Richard Watson Gilder, poet and editor of The Century magazine, and his wife, painter Helena Kay Gilder, held weekly salons where members of the art world met with industrialists and politicians. Dewing, Paderewski and Modrzejewska (who introduced Paderewski to Gilder), belonged to this group and shared ideals about the role of the arts in society and its aesthetic traits. Gilder wrote poems for both Dewing and Paderewski (“how Paderewski Plays” – reproduced in the Polish Music Journal vol. 4 no. 1, 2001). Dewing’s painting “Summer” provided graphic elements for his decorations on a Steinway piano no. 100,000 made for the White House in 1903. Paderewski played on this piano and was sponsored by Steinway during his American tours. The paper is based on poetry, painting, press reports, and documents in American and Polish American archives, including a newly discovered Stojowski Collection.

During the Meeting of the Society for American Music, Maja Trochimczyk was elected to serve as the Chair of the SAM Book Subsidy Committee – awarding grants to worthy book projects about various aspects of American music.

Polish Dance Lecture For American Music Teachers

On 4 February 2003, by invitation from Nancy Fierro, program chairman of the California Chapter of the Association of Music Teachers met at the Mount Mary College in West Los Angeles, to listen to a lecture given by Maja Trochimczyk and illustrated with live original choreography by members of the Krakusy Polish Folk Dance Ensemble, including the group’s star choreographer from Poland, Maciej Pasternak. The lecture presented the history of selected Polish dances, main steps, types of folk music that used to be played in villages (from documentary recordings issued by the Polish Radio’s department of Traditional Music), and illustrations of polonaise, kujawiak, oberek and krakowiak presented live by four dancers from the Krakusy ensemble. The Krakusy dancers showed the audience three types of Polish costumes: national costume of 17th century nobility for the polonaise, the Krakowski costume for the krakowiak, and the Lowicki costume from the Mazovia area in central Poland for the kujawiak and oberek.

Krakusy is the largest and oldest Polish folk dance groups in Los Angeles, active for over 40 years. The name means “men from Kraków” i.e. the old capital of Poland and the capital of the region of Małopolska; the term itself comes from a southern dialect of Polish. Their choreographer, Maciej Pasternak, is the expert on Polish folk dance and song who came to coach Krakusy for two years. The group was represented during the lecture by Joanna Szupińska, Zofia Ślusarz, Mr. Pasternak. The choreographer prepared dances to the music of Wojciech Kilar (Polonaise from the film by Andrzej Wajda, Pan Tadeusz), Karol Szymanowski (Krakowiak), Henryk Wieniawski (Kujawiak and Oberek, version for violin and orchestra), and Fryderyk Chopin (Polonaise in A flat, theme only). Other examples were shown with music by folk dance ensembles from the Mazowsze and Małopolska areas. At the end of the lecture-performance, the teachers were invited to join the dancers on the stage and learn how to dance the polonaise, with the basic step and some characteristic figures used in the processional “weaving” of the dance around the stage.

The musical examples included a range of mazurkas, obereks, kujawiaks, and krakowiaks from various areas within both regions, showing a great variety of styles and patterns. The instrumental settings ranged from a solo violin and or accordion, to the instrument accompanied by folk drums, by the folk string “basy” and a whole “kapela” – ensemble of musicians, with clarinet, several violins, drums, accordion, etc. The recordings and the material come from the Polish Music Center’s collections, the text of Maja Trochimczyk’s lecture, entitled “Introduction to Polish Dances” was based on abridged essays from the Web publication of entries on the krakowiak, polonaise, oberek, mazur, and kujawiak at the “dance” site at the PMC: ../dance/index.html

Polish Word “Krakowiak” In Spelling Contest In Hawaii!

The name of one of Poland’s five national dances, the Krakowiak, was used in a spelling contest in Maui. Eighth grader, Nathaniel Salazar, survived 23 rounds to capture The Honolulu Advertiser Spelling Bee’s District contest by knowing how to spell “krakowiak,” which is a dance in 2/4 meter and is named after the city of its origin, Krakow. (Maybe he was in a folk-dance group and thus familiar with the not-so-common word – or maybe he knows his geography. There is a Chopin Society in Hawaii. Daniel Kij of Buffalo sent this in).

Szpilman, The Pianist

by Wanda Wilk

Roman Polanski’s film, “The Pianist” has been garnering many awards, nominations and prizes. It won the Top Prize Palme D’or at the Cannes Film Festival and won for Best Picture and other categories from the National Society of Film Critics, the Boston Society of Film Critics, the San Francisco Film Critics Circle, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts and the French Cesars. It was nominated for the Golden Globe Awards and the Oscars in many categories and in Poland it was nominated in all thirteen for their Oscar-equivalents, the “Orły” [Eagles].

Based on a book published in 1999 “The Pianist. The Extraordinary True Story of One Man’s Survival in Warsaw 1939-1945,” the film is a true historical documentary about Wladyslaw Szpilman, a Polish-Jewish musician who worked for Polish Radio when the Nazis invaded Poland during WWII and how he survived the ordeal with the help of his Polish friends, particularly actor Andrzej Bogucki, and in the end, by the kindness of a German officer, Captain Wilm Hosenfeld, who was himself a musician and teacher.

The film inspired many articles recently – see last month’s newsletter. Since the film dealt with only one aspect of the musician’s life, his ordeal for survival, I wondered how many moviegoers have thought about Szpilman’s life before and after that and about what role did he play in the life of Polish music? Here is the answer:

Władysław Szpilman was born on December 5, 1911 in Sosnowiec. He studied at the Chopin Academy in Warsaw from 1926 to 1930 and then went on to Berlin to study piano at the Music Academy under Kreutzer and Arthur Schnabel and composition under Schreker. He returned to Warsaw in 1933 to study with the great Polish master, Adam Michalowski. He worked for Polish Radio from 1935-63 as a pianist, with a break during the war years, and from 1945 on as assistant to the chief director of the music section. He performed both as a soloist and with famous violinists Bronisław Gimpel and Tadeusz Wroński. He organized the Warsaw Quintet in 1962 by adding Stefan Kamasa, viola and Aleksander Ciechański on the cello to violinists Gimpel and Wroński and gave more than 2,000 concerts until 1986 with them in the U.S., Japan and Mexico.

He also composed from an early age. He wrote a Violin Concerto in 1931 (at age 20) and one book lists it a having been lost during the Warsaw Uprising and another lists it as having been published by PWM, the official music publisher. Perhaps, they meant that the original manuscript was destroyed. He wrote several orchestral pieces: Concertino for Piano and Orchestra (1939). He also wrote a Paraphrase on Own Theme (1947 ), Small Overture (1967), Ballet Scene (1968) and Waltz in Old Style (1969).

He wrote several piano pieces: Life of Machines (1931), Toccatina, Three Miniatures(1954), Little Piano Pieces (1972) and music to three films: Wrzos (1937), Doktor Murek(1939) and Zadzwońcie do mojej żony [Call my Wife] (1957).

However, he was best known for his songs. He wrote more than 500 of them (with 50 of them for children) between 1945 and 1978. Some of them were published by PWM; others in Czytelnik and Synkopa. Many of them were hits: Czerwony autobus [Red Bus], Nie wierzę piosence [I don’t believe the song], Tych lat nie odda nikt [No One Can Return Those Years], and Zakochani [Lovers]. Szpilman received an award from Polish Radio for his Children’s Songs in 1953 and in 1954 won Third Prize for Three Piano Miniatures in a competition sponsored by the Polish Composers’ Union.

His songs were sung by many of the popular singers of the day, especially Sława Przybylska (Mgła [Fog] and Zakochani [Lovers] and several of them were in the repertoire of Syrena Teatr. These pop songs were fox-trots, rumbas, beguines, tangos, waltzes and slow-fox. The latter, Oddaj mi każdy dzień [Give Me Back Each Day] was named Song of the Month in October, 1960 by Polish Radio.

Many of his songs were published in an illustrated music magazine “Śpiewamy i Tańczymy” [We Sing and Dance], which began as a bi-weekly in 1954 and from 1963 as a monthly. It was devoted to the most popular dance songs of the day. Each issue contained three, four or five of the most popular songs heard on radio and from pop singers. The journal also featured articles about music, composers, famous performers, events, etc…

In the first issue we find To idzie młodość [Here comes youth], by Sygietynski (of Mazowsze fame); a foxtrot Sto lat [100 Years] by Szpilman and a tango Siedem róż[Seven Roses] by Maklakiewicz. The third number seems to have been devoted to the city of Warsaw, with songs by Sygietyński, Tu jest Warszawa [And Here is Warsaw] and Szpilman’s Pojdę na Stare Miasto [I will Go to Old Town]. All in all, in the 194 issues published between 1954 and 1962 there were 47 songs by Szpilman. From 1963 there were only a few. I also noticed songs by non-Polish composers, like, “O Sole Mio,” “Solvejg’s Song” “La cucaracha” “Siboney” “Duke Ellington’s “Caravan,” Gershwin’s “I’ve Got Plenty o’Nothing,” Schubert’s “Serenade” and so on, all the songs that were popular in other parts of the world in the 1950s and 1960s. Of the Polish composers’ songs I found songs by Danilowski, who had founded the famous Chor Dana with Mieczysław Fogg as soloist. These songs were “Co nam zostało z tych lat” [What Has Been Left From These Years], as well as the most popular songs by Poland’s Irving Berlin- Henryk Wars (Henry Vars)- one of which was featured in the film in a scene where the pianist plays in a coffee house in the ghetto (Umowiłem się z nią na dziewiątą).

These issues also included many of the songs from the two Folk Dance and Song Ensembles, Śląsk and Mazowsze arranged by their leaders, Hadyna and Sygietyński. Songs by Lutosławski were also included, as well as those written under his pseudonym, Derwid. The late composer always mentioned that he had to compose music for radio and children in school in order to make a living and many of the outstanding Polish composers of the 20th c. did the same.

I am happy to say that the Polish Music Center at USC has several of Szpilman’s songs in its archives. They are part of the Walter Ossowski collection that was donated to the Center by the generosity of Irene Semski from Buffalo, NY two years ago. We have a PWM publication of an album, “Piesni i piosenki wybrane;” “Walczyk murarski;” also some of the “Spiewamy i Tanczymy” numbers, specifically 1970 #6 and 1972 #3.

There is also a 5-CD set entitled “Szpilman. Musical Portrait” which was released by Polish Radio in 2000 to honor the great artist and composer. The music is taken from the Polish Radio Archives and give a beautiful picture of the man and his music. There are nineteen of his most popular songs, sung by Irena Santor, Hanna Skarzanka, Mieczyslaw Fogg, Andrzej Bogucki, Chor Czejanda, Marta Mirska, Slawa Przybylska, Rena Rolska, Ludmila Jakubczak and Joanna Rawik.

As a pianist he is featured in a recording of his Concertino from a Polish Radio performance in 1969. He also plays a Chopin Mazurka and a Nocturne, as well as three pieces by Rachmaninoff and Schumann. In another of the CDs he plays Brahms, Grieg and Cesar Franck with violinist Bronisław Gimpel. The fourth CD features the Warsaw Quintet in music by Brahms and Schumann. The last one is devoted to children, with music composed by Szpilman to poems by Broniewski, Brzechwa, Januszewska, Tuwim and Krzemienicka and to three fairy tales by Brzechwa, Chotomska and Januszewska. According to the CD notes, Polish composer Wojciech Kilar compared Szpilman to Cole Porter, Gershwin and McCartney, and told of his envy of Szpilman’s talent to write beautiful melodies. The famous Kilar also is the music composer for the Polanski film.

The Polish Music Center received the CD set from Andrzej Szpilman, the composer’s son, who came to Los Angeles for the premiere of his father’s Piano Concertino in April, 2001 at Encino’s Valley Beth Shalom by the Los Angeles Jewish Symphony conducted by Noreen Green. Richard S. Ginell wrote the review for the LA Times of the concert and said, “the most memorable work” of the concert was Szpilman’s. He wrote that it was written in the Warsaw Ghetto in 1940 but never performed until Sunday night, with a remarkable 16-year-old pianist, Arthur Abadi, doing solo honors. Playing on a catchy four-note motif, the piece sounds like a European reaching across the sea to a fellow Jew composer, George Gershwin, with bluesy, rhapsodic flourishes capped by a jazzy final chord.”As I mentioned at the beginning, the film is based on the book written by Szpilman. It was first written in Polish right after the war, but because of the prevailing political conditions it did not succeed in getting published. The English version was published in 1999 and was named Book of the Year by the LA Times. I found the Epilogue very interesting. “Szpilman began working for Radio Warszawa with the same piece that he had been playing live on the radio that last day, amidst a hail of German artillery and bombs.” The piece is Chopin’s Nocturne in C-sharp Minor.

I also learned in the Epilogue that the German officer was taken prisoner by the Russians and died in a prisoner of war camp at Stalingrad in 1952, a year before Stalin’s death. Szpilman had learned his identity and tried to save him, to no avail and later found out about his tragic end. He also visited the widow during one of his tours in Germany. The “Pianist” died on July 6, 2000 in Warsaw at age 88 – but his music lives on. His songs have been an integral part of Polish culture and have enriched it for more than fifty years.

Recent Performances

Music Of Wojciech Kilar

In a series of concerts of contemporary music, the Little Orchestra Society, with its director, Dino Anagnost conducting, presented an evening of film music that included some of the brilliant work of Wojciech Kilar, one of Poland’s major composers. Under the title, NO SUBTITLES NEEDED: The Language of Foreign Film Music, the popular orchestra is presenting a tribute to Federico Fellini and the composer Nino Rota, with music from La Strada and La Dolce Vita, as well as Rota’s music from Visconti’s The Leopard. Other selections include the Oscar-winning score from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, the immensely popular themes of Michel LeGrand, and the premiere of a score by the Greek composer, Minos Matsas. Apart from Wojciech Kilar’s widely performed orchestral and chamber pieces, he is probably best known internationally for his film scores, of which there are about 150, including those for many early Zanussi films, Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Andrzej Wajda’s Pan Tadeusz, and Roman Polanski’s The Pianist.

Discography

by Wanda Wilk

Reviewed in Fanfare Jan/Feb ’03 issue

CHANDOS CHAN 10016. Szymanowski, Janacek & Haas String Quartets. Australian Chamber Orchestra, Richard Tognetti, cond.

Yet another review of the string quartets arranged by Tognetti for chamber orchestra. At first, Adrian Corleonis questions the arranging of these quartets (particularly the Janacek) from four musicians to twenty-three players, “but I was wrong” he says. “Perhaps the Szymanowski Second Quartet gains the most by Tognetti’s arrangement, as some of the more rebarbative features of his last, folk-derived manner are softened in being expanded from what sounds sketchy for quartet to something one may feel as a realization. The `night music’ first movement is eerier and more atmospheric, the second movement’s drunken, rustic hoe-down turns orgiastically sinister, and the hysteria of the last movement’s fugue takes on a cataclysmic dimension. That is, in every case, there was more music in these works than met the ear in their original scoring – or at least it is so when heard in the transcendent artistry of the Australian Chamber Orchestra. Sound strikes the ideal balance between close detail and spaciousness, with gratifying gutsiness. Left to my own inclinations, I would have passed this by – and been the poorer for it. Enthusiastically recommended.”

CHANDOS CHAN 9986.
Karlowicz. Eternal Songs, Op. 10. Stanislaw and Anna of Oswiecim, Op. 12. Lithuanian Rhapsody, Op. 11. Yan Pascal Tortelier, cond. BBC Philharmonic Orchestra.

This was reviewed favorably in Gramophone and reported on in our October ’02 Newsletter. Now it is Martin Anderson’s turn to rave about the composer and his three tone-poems. He describes and analyzes them and likes the second one, Eternal Songs, the best. He appears to be well-acquainted with Poland’s first symphonist – Mieczyslaw Karlowicz (1876-1909) and with Polish recordings of them, both old and new. He doesn’t believe that the new DUX/Salwarowski, nor the present Chandos recording, “beat the old (1965) Wislocki recording once available on Olympia (OCD 307). He also knows that Thorofon recorded the Eternal Songs along with the Violin Concerto, but he has not heard it. He urges everyone to explore this latest recording and also informs us that DUX “has also released a CD of Karlowicz (and Szymanowski) songs with Urszula Kryger and Katarzyna Jankowska-Borzykowska on DUX 0361, and you’ll find his Serenade. Op. 2, for strings on DUX 0737.

INNOVA 568
Skrowaczewski. Musica a 4. String Trio. Fantaisie per 6. Ensemble Capriccio. Burt Hara (cl); Karl Paulnack (pn); William Schricket (db); John Snow (ob).

This was recommended by Ken Smith in Gramophone’s October ’02 issue. In Fanfare’s Jan/Feb’03 number, Paul A. Snook gives a great review. He begins, “Although the Polisih-born, Paris- trained Stanislaw Skrowaczewski (b. 1923) is best known in this country as a brilliant maestro (for nearly two decades he headed the Minnesota Symphony, from the very first during the immediate post-war years in Europe he was celebrated also as a gifted composer and former pupil of Nadia Boulanger. His most impressive 1955 Music in the Night (once available on a vinyl Louisville recording) plus a Symphony for Strings and a set of Symphonic Variations all helped to establish his reputation throughout the West.”

“While he never abandoned composition during his Minnesota years (the Concerto for English Horn in 1969, first recorded on Desto LP and later reissued by Phoenix, was especially noteworthy), since he retired as conductor of the Halle Orchestra in 1991, Skrowaczewski has added extensively to a growing stream of works for both orchestra and chamber ensemble; three of the latter group are represented on this release.”

Paul Snook concludes, “The performances by the Ensemble Capriccio (the string trio), Burt Hara, and the other instrumentalists featured in the third work are at the same time incredibly exact and exhilaratingly improvisatory. In fact, the playing on this disc is so white-hot and intensely enthralling and convincing, it will take the listener’s breath away…Produced by the American Composers Forum of St. Paul and highlighting probably the most talented Pole of the post-Lutoslawski generation, this has to be one of the outstanding chamber music discs of the current year.”

Seen in BBC Music Magazine, February 2003

Murray Perahia’s latest Chopin CD is still in The Top 20 Classical CD Chart in England, now at #10.

Deutsche Gramophone Reissues

DG 471 588-2

DG has reissued the definitive recordings of Witold Lutoslawski’s Partita, Chain 2 and Piano Concerto, with the composer conducting Anne-Sophie Mutter, violin and pianist Krystian Zimerman.

The March BBC cover CD is the acclaimed Szymanowski Quartet’s performance of Brahms’ Clarinet Quintet and Mozart’s String Quintet in D, K 593.

Calendar of Events

MAR 1 & 4: Szymanowski: Violin Concerto No. 1, Op. 35. Nikolaj Znajder, violin. Daniel Barenboim, cond. Chicago Symphony Orchestra. 8:00 p.m. & 7:30 p.m.

MAR 2: Polish Dance Concert: Polonaise, Krakowiak, Mazur, Oberek and dances from the Warsaw, Rzeszow and Opoczyn regions. Polish American Folk Dance Company and 70 students from Father Kordecki’s Polish School in Manhattan. Jacek Surdyka, choreographer. 2:00 p.m. Fashion Institute of Technology, 7th Ave & 27th st. 212-475-4576. www.internetpl.com/koncert.jpg

MAR 6, 7 & 9: Lutoslawski: Symphony No. 4, also Ravel & Strauss. Los Angeles Philharmonic, Esa-Pekka Salonen, cond. 8:00 p.m. & 2:30 p.m. (9). $14-$82. 323-850-2000. laphil.com

MAR 8: Music by Chopin, Paderewski, Szymanowski & Wieniawski. Karol Radziwonowicz, piano. Tomasz Radziwonowicz, violin. Wieslaw Ochman, tenor. Palace of Legion of Honor. 34th & Clement Ave. 6:00 p.m. $55. Students $35. Opening concert of “Splendor of Poland” exhibit.

MAR 14: “The Polish Violin Tradition.” Music by Bacewicz, Elsner, Gorecki, Noskowski, Paderewski, Poldowski & Szymanowski. Tyrone Greive, violin. Ellen Burmeister, piano. Kosciuszko Foundation. 15 E. 65th St. NY. 212-734- 2130. www.kosciuszkofoundation.org.

MAR 23: Bacewicz: String Quartet. Cassatt String Quartet. Kosciuszko Foundation. 212-734-2130.

MAR 27, 28 & 29: Szymanowski: Violin Concerto No. 1. Also Wagner & Strauss. Christian Tetzlof, violin. Fabio Ruisi, cond. Boston Symphony Orchestra. Symphony Hall, Boston. 8:00 p.m. $28-$90.

MAR 30: Polish Voices, Polish Songs. Selections from classical folk & jazz. California Club 1750 Clay St. 2:00 p.m. Part of “Splendor of Poland Exhibit.”

Anniversaries

Born This Month

1 March 1810 – Fryderyk Chopin, virtuoso pianist, Poland’s greatest composer
2 March 1927 – Witold Szalonek, composer (d. 2001).
3 March 1922 – Kazimierz Serocki, composer, co-founder of the Warsaw AutumnFestival (80 years)
6 March 1975 – Karol Kurpiński, composer, father of national opera
6 March 1835 – Ludwik Grossman, composer, pianist, and piano merchant (d. 1915)
7 March 1911 – Stefan Kisielewski, composer, essayist, writer
10 March 1937 – Bernadetta Matuszczak, composer
14 March 1913 – Witold Rudziński, composer
17 March 1901 – Piotr Perkowski, composer
17 March 1925 – Tadeusz Prejzner. composer, pianist active in popular music
18 March 1961 – Hanna Kulenty, composer
21 March 1936 – Marek Stachowski, composer
23 March 1933 – Andrzej Trzaskowski, composer, jazz pianist and conductor
23 March 1888 – Lidia Kmitowa, violinist and teacher (d. 1980)
27 March 1927 – Joachim Olkuśnik, composer
28 March 1954 – Paweł Szymański, composer

Died This Month

2 March 1887 – Wilhelm Troschel, singer and song of piano maker
4 March 1939 – Józef Sliwiński, pianist, composer (b. 1862)
4 March 1925 – Maurycy (Moritz) Moszkowski, composer and pianist (b. 1854)
4 March 1895 – Stanisław Niedzielski, singer (baritone), choral conductor.
14 March 1954 – Ludomir Rogowski (b. 3 Oct 1881)
15 March 1883 – Karol Studziński, violinist (b. 1828)
15 March 1948 – Konrad Neuger, conductor, active in the U.S. since 1931 (b. 1890)
19 March 1876 – Józef Stefani, composer, conductor, violinist, son of Jan (b. 1800)
21 March 1973 – Antoni Szałowski, composer
22 March 1893 – Adam Herman Hermanowski, cellist, child prodigy and virtuoso (b. 1836)
29 March 1937 – Karol Szymanowski, composer, pianist
29 March 1959 – Zdzisław Szulc, curator of music instruments museum in Poznań
31 March 1880 – Henryk Wieniawski, composer, virtuoso violinist
31 March 1946 – Aleksandra Stromfeld-Klamzynska-Szuminska, soprano (b. 1859)