By Marek Zebrowski Christmas in July! Amazingly enough, this rather overused turn of phrase in this particular instance actually correctly describes the shower of amazing gifts and donations that the Polish Music Center received throughout the month of July. The first and historically most significant among them is a tranche of correspondence between Nancy Fierro,…Continue Reading July 2023 Gifts
Leading classical music label NAXOS has several exciting new releases featuring Polish creativity. This month NAXOS highlights Polish opera and string quartets. Janek by Żeleński Described by period writers and fellow composers, Zygmunt Stojowski and Jarosław Zieliński, as the most influential Polish composer of the fin-de-siècle, Żeleński was the teacher of a generation of composers…Continue Reading New on Naxos June 2023
By Marek Zebrowski Warsaw Autumn Sounds Mieczysław Kominek, President of the Polish Composers’ Union (ZKP) and Director of the Polish Music Information Centre in Warsaw (POLMIC), recently sent us the sound chronicles of the 2020 Warsaw Autumn Festival. This time around it is a set of three CDs, featuring the highlights of concerts that took…Continue Reading PMC Gifts: Spring 2023
Polish composer Joanna Bruzdowicz, a great friend and benefactor of the Polish Music Center, would have been eighty years old this May 17. Unfortunately, she unexpectedly passed away at her residence in the south of France on November 3, 2021. Since then, her three sons—Mark, Jan and Jörg Tittel with their families—had generously donated a…Continue Reading Sounds of History
Pump Out the Music! Virtuoso accordionist Wiesław Ochwat (above) teamed up with maestro Maciej Tworek and the Sinfonietta Cracovia ensemble to record two new concertos for accordion and orchestra for the Opus label (86 | 2022). Their CD features Maciej Zimka’s Concerto for Accordion and Chamber Orchestra and Mikołaj Majkusiak’s Concerto In Between for the…Continue Reading Feb 2023: PMC Gifts
Los Angeles based pianist Nancy Fierro, known for her championship of women composers, has recorded and performed in concert a number of works by Polish composers. A longtime fan of music by Grażyna Bacewicz (1909-1969), and a friend of her late sister, Wanda, Fierro recorded Bacewicz’s monumental Second Piano Sonata some years ago. Fierro also…Continue Reading Szymanowska on Spotify
Together with Polish Music Publishers (PWM Edition) and ANAKLASIS Records, the Henryk Wieniawski Musical Society of Poznań will present the online concert “The Legend Anew.” The concert will take place on September 7 at 6:00 p.m. CEST at the Bazar Hotel in Poznań, and will be broadcast via the Wieniawski Society’s YouTube channel. The event…Continue Reading Concert, Recording & Wieniawski Festival Kickoff
Spring has sprung (as it annually does) and this time around it also brought a shower of fine gifts to the Polish Music Center. There was much excitement around the PMC’s Spring Concert at the end of March, mainly because of the long-delayed world premiere of Mojave—an atmospherically beguiling and deeply musically satisfying work for…Continue Reading PMC Gifts: Marcel Chyrzyński
By Marek Zebrowski Among Polish pianists, Raul Koczalski (1884-1948) is considered among the most important interpreters of Chopin. Born in Warsaw, he made his first public appearance at the age of four and shortly thereafter was admired by the great Anton Rubinstein in St. Petersburg and became a student of Karol Mikuli (one of the…Continue Reading PMC Gifts, May 2022: Koczalski on Record
Leading classical music label NAXOS and its related brands have several exciting new releases featuring Polish creativity. Weinberg Featured on Album of Concertos Concertos for Trumpet and Piano Shostakovich: Piano Concerto in C Minor Op. 35, Weinberg: Trumpet Concerto in B-Flat Major Op. 94, Jolivet: Concerto for Trumpet, Piano, and Strings, Rachmaninov: 6 Songs Op….Continue Reading New on Naxos