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• WL100/1-81: The Complete List

Friday, 2 January 2015 2 Comments

2015

January
• 2.01.15 WL100/1-81: The Complete List
• 1.01.15 WL100/81: Roussel 3, Lutosławski 3

• Sustained Glissando

Wednesday, 8 October 2014 Leave a comment

2014 marks the tenth anniversary of one of the most remarkable publishing ventures in Polish music.
Glissando magazine has ploughed its own furrow determinedly since 2004, despite a few rocky moments around 2008. It has produced an average of two issues per year, in an A4 format, on no-nonsense matt paper and eschewing colour temptations except everything on the chart between black to white. Its design is quirky (characteristically Polish) and often reminds me of a cross between underground literature (but of a much higher print quality) and art movements of decades ago. The most recent issue (no.24) has gone glossy without losing its character. The contents are listed at the end of this post.

The intent of Glissando has been clear from the start: to provide an alternative to mainstream music journalism and musicology. It has done so by stressing what is going on in the work of composers and writers in their 20s and 30s and by giving a main focus to each issue (but not to the exclusion of all else). As you can see from the banner headings given below, there was an early emphasis on music in other countries, on broader issues and concepts, and on digging into the past. This has been nuanced over the years, with certain themes recurring, notably the exploration of sound and space. The next issue (no.25, edited by Antoni Michnik) is called ‘Manifestos’ while the one after that (no.26, edited by Krzysztof B. Marciniak) returns to a familiar topic, ‘Soundscape’.

Since the start of 2014, Glissando has gone for guest editors (from within and without its regular team) and this gives great scope for diversity and depth. But one must acknowledge that there have been, and still are, key figures in Glissando‘s history, among them Jan Topolski and Michał Mendyk. Topolski is still at the centre of things and, in addition, has written a wonderful study of Gérard Grisey – Widma i Czasy (Spectra and Time; Warsaw, 2012). Michał Mendyk has moved sideways to develop the independent record company, Bôlt, which has likewise pursued a distinct identity and now has a unique repertoire of archival and new recordings from Poland and elsewhere in Eastern Europe.

Other important contributors to the success of Glissando include Agata Kwiecińska and Eliza Orzechowska, who were part of the team from the beginning, and others, more recently, including Jacek Plewicki and Filip Lech. The roster of writers includes notable names, of which I will mention only two here – Monica Pasiecznik and Michał Libera, partly because, like Jan Topolski writing on Grisey, they have gone on to publish major studies in the music series published by Wydawnictwo Krytyki Politycznej. There are two books by Pasiecznik – Rytuał superformuły. Stockhausen Licht (The Ritual of Superformulae. Stockhausen’s Licht; Warsaw, 2011) and Po zmierzchu. Eseje o współczesnych operach, co-authored with Tomasz Bierniacki (After Twilight. Essays on Contemporary Opera; Warsaw, 2013) – and one by Libera (who is also the guest editor of Glissando 24) – Doskonale zwyczajna rzeczywistość. Socjologia, geografia albo metafizyka muzyki (A Perfectly Ordinary Reality. The Sociology, Geography or Metaphysics of Music; Warsaw, 2013).

(In parenthesis, it is worth noting that it was Topolski, Mendyk and Libera who set up the 4.99 Foundation that runs Glissando, Bôłt Records and other projects.)

There has been an important strategic decision made this year at Glissando, and that is to switch to English rather than stay in Polish. The primary intention is to attract contributors and readers from elsewhere in Eastern Europe rather than from ‘The West’. This focus on new music in Eastern Europe matches Bôłt’s existing strategy.

The printed edition of no.23 is half-and-half Polish-English, no.24 completely in English. Both languages are represented online. The English online choice currently consists of just six articles (up from four last week): one from no.17, one from no.22, three from no.23 and one from no.24. (A glance at this last item indicates that there may be textual and illustrative differences between the printed and online versions.) The Polish online choice is much wider; it may even be comprehensive – I can’t tell (it stretches right back to no.1). The plan for future issues is to have all articles in both languages, one in print and the other online. It would be a tall task to translate all the past Polish articles into English, but one lives in hope that some of them will be singled out.

The Glissando website is well worth a visit, even if it may take a while to work out how to navigate the differently constructed English and Polish sections. Long may it and its team challenge and provoke!

2014
• 24 Avant-Avantgarde
• 23 The Cassette Tape (with audio cassette)
2013
• 22 Noise
• 21 Performance/Performativity
2012
• 20 Swiss Music
2011
• 19 Polish Music (German-language issue)
• 18 Sound in Public Space
• 17 Hip-hop – Microtones
2010
• 16 Space – Italy – Mykietyn
2009
• 15 Lithuania
2007
• 13-14 Rock
• 12 Wrocław
• 10-11 Benelux – Music and Cinema
2006
• 09 Austria
• 08 Scandinavia
2005
• 07 The 60s and 70s
• 05-06 Darmstadt School +
• 04 Electronic Music
• 03 Free Improvisation – Young Composers
2004
• 02 New York
• 01 Spectral Music – Japanese Avantgarde

Glissando no.24, ‘Avant Avantgarde’

• Michał Libera, Introducing Avant Avantgarde (p.4)
• Michał Libera, Amplifying the Sound: Technology of delivery – early amplifiers, mutes and the politics of volume (p.10)
• Pamela Granatowski, Projecting the Sound: Listening to Axis Mundi (p.28)
• Ewa Kozik, Processing the Sound: On more or less natural sound alterations (p.40)
• Antoni Michnik, Visualizing the Sound: Pre-phonographic analysis and reproduction of sound (p.50)
• Jan Topolski, Generating the Tone: Stay tuned, keep temper (p.66)
• Barbara Bogunia, Automating the Sound: Ars combinatoria and mystical automata (p.82)
• Maciej Śledziecki & Marion Wörle, Avant Avantgarde Instruments: We wonder why (p.98)

Filed under Books & Articles, Music Dissemination, Music post-1937, Music pre-1938, Websites Tagged with Glissando magazine, Jan Topolski

• New Sikorski & Panufnik websites

Sunday, 28 September 2014 Leave a comment

During this year’s Warsaw Autumn festival two new composer websites were launched. This brings the roster of such Polish sites to eight over the past three years and they are an invaluable source for anyone wanting to learn more about Polish music.

Tomasz Sikorski‘s life and career were sadly short – he died in 1988 aged 49, and his decline is poignantly described in the biographical section of http://www.sikorski.polmic.pl/. His music speaks of personal angst translated into obsessive repetition and an uncompromising approach to musical material, which is characteristically stark. But it is by the same token compelling. The focus piece is Music in Twilight, presented in video from the 2006 Warsaw Autumn. There are a few pieces on YouTube and I wrote a post on 13 November 2013 in which I give these YouTube items (as they were available then) plus details of two recent CD issues of Sikorski’s music.

Andrzej Panufnik needs no introduction, one might think, but his centenary year has not been as comprehensively covered in concert as one would wish. Earlier this year, the POLMIC (Polish Music Information Centre) series in which Sikorski’s site is the latest, set up a site devoted to Panufnik. Now, NINATEKA, hosted by Narodowy Instytut Audiowizualny (National Audiovisual Institute), has added him to its collection alongside Górecki, Lutosławski and Penderecki, whose ‘Three Composers‘ site went live at the end of 2013. These sites are primarily audiovisual but there are also highly informative notes on each piece. You may choose English or Polish pathways.

Almost all of Panufnik’s compositions are available on http://ninateka.pl/kolekcje/en/panufnik/ in audio format (sometimes in two performances) and there are a dozen video files. The most interesting of the latter are two fairly recent films on Panufnik: Errata do biografii (Grzegorz Braun, 2008, in English/Polish) in which Panufnik’s life is explored, especially the Polish years, and My Father, the Iron Curtain and Me (Krzysztof Rzączyński, 2009, in English/Polish), in which his son Jeremy travels to Poland to explore his relationship with his father.

Filed under Audio, Music Dissemination, Music post-1937, Panufnik, T. Sikorski, TV & Video, Websites Tagged with Andrzej Panufnik, Ninateka, POLMIC, Tomasz Sikorski

• New Website for Panufnik

Friday, 16 May 2014 Leave a comment

http://www.panufnik.polmic.pl

One of the most valuable initiatives of the Polish Music Information Centre (POLMIC), in conjunction with the Polish Composers’ Union (ZKP) and other institutes and publishers, is a series of composer websites. The first, in 2012, was devoted to Kazimierz Serocki, and the second, in 2013, to Tadeusz Baird. Today, it is the turn of Andrzej Panufnik, in his centenary year. With the launch last year of the threecomposers.pl website at NINATEKA (Górecki, Lutosławski, Penderecki), there are now accessible sources in English and Polish for six of Poland’s most distinctive composers of the second half of the twentieth century.

The leading light of the editorial team on the Panufnik site is Beata Bolesławska-Lewandowska (she was closely involved involved in its predecessors). The three POLMIC sites have similar formats, although the Panufnik site is more extensive. It has eight principal sections, most with several sub-sections: Life, Timeline, Work, Musical Inspirations, Places, Gallery, Bibliography, Discography, plus a featured work, in this case Sinfonia sacra.

It looks as thorough and informative as its predecessors. There are, for example, excerpts from most works at the top of their individual entries, which give useful background information on compositional circumstances, Panufnik’s concept and reception. There is even information on the mass songs (with pages from the published scores). The six entries under Musical Inspirations are useful little essays and a new feature (Places), possibly taking its cue from the mobile app released a year ago for Lutosławski’s Warsaw, explores half-a-dozen locations in each of Poland and Great Britain that were significant to Panufnik.

As one might expect, the Gallery of photos is especially rich, given Camilla Panufnik’s renown as a photographer. The Bibliography is substantial and the CD Discography looks comprehensive. There is the occasional navigational oddity (the audio excerpts are grouped under Gallery-Music), while the left sidebar can be a bit too sensitive to the touch of the cursor. It would also be helpful sometime to have English translations of the documents that feature as photographs.

This new Panufnik site is an exceptional new resource, and a credit to all involved. It is well worth investigating at leisure. I wonder who will be next in this series?

Later on 16.05.14: Beata Bolesławska-Lewandowska has informed me that the next composer in the series will be Tomasz Sikorski – excellent news. His website will be launched at the 2014 ‘Warsaw Autumn’ festival.

Filed under Audio, Music Dissemination, Music post-1937, Panufnik, TV & Video, Websites Tagged with Andrzej Panufnik, Beata Bolesławska-Lewandowska, Iwona Lindstedt, Polish Composers' Union, Polish Music Information Centre, POLMIC, ZKP

• Lutosławski Report (Warsaw, 2013)

Monday, 17 June 2013 Leave a comment

The Institute of Music and Dance in Warsaw has today issued a Report on the presence of Witold Lutosławski’s music in the musical life of Poland and the world. Its author is Ewa Cichoń. It covers mainly the years since Lutosławski’s death in 1994, up to the end of 2012. The report, which exists in English and Polish pdfs (links below), contains a wide range of data:

• Performances in Poland and abroad
• Selected festivals in Poland
• CD recordings
• Literature
• Literature – list of publications
• Films and DVDs
• Programmes broadcast on TVP (Polish TV)
• Websites devoted to Lutosławski
• Researchers and promoters
• Institutions
• Institutions, festivals, competitions bearing Lutosławski’s name
• Others connected with Lutosławski
• Musical works dedicated to Lutosławski
• A public survey on Lutosławski
• Appendix: Publication of Lutosławski’s works
• Appendix: Broadcasts on Polish Radio

• English-language version of the report
• Polish-language version of the report

Filed under 'Warsaw Autumn', Audio, Books & Articles, Concerts, Lutosławski, Music Dissemination, Music post-1937, Music Publishing, Other Festivals, Radio, TV & Video, Websites Tagged with Ewa Cichoń, Institute, Institute of Music and Dance, Instytut Muzyki i Tańca, Lutosławski, Raport, Report

• WL100/30: Notebook, 7 April 1960

Sunday, 7 April 2013 Leave a comment

Lutosławski on Cage

The bottom of this pot, from which we all draw, is already visible. The zealous ones (Cage) have already scraped it. As for me – I’m not particularly hurrying towards that moment, to which our history of music is unavoidably heading, i.e. the absence of all music.

W tym garnku, z którego wszyscy czerpiemy, już widać dno. Co gorliwsi (Cage) już się do niego doskrobali. Co do mnie – nie śpieszę się tak do tej chwili, do której zmierza nieuchronnie nasza historia muzyki, tj. do braku wszelkiej muzyki.

Witold Lutosławski, 7 April 1960 [my translation]

This reaction to Cage, and what he stood for, was indicative of Lutosławski’s essentially traditional frame of mind, even when he was trying to break free of the past in early 1960. What is strange about this comment is that only three weeks earlier Cage had had a liberating effect on Lutosławski’s music. It has been known for a long time that Lutosławski heard a performance of Cage’s Piano Concert (1958) on the radio in 1960. This chance hearing was a bolt from the blue for Lutosławski’s subsequent development, but commentators have never pinpointed the date.

The broadcast details are contained in Danuta Gwizdalanka’s commentary on the Lutosławski Guide to Warsaw app (Routes>Warsovian>Saskia [sic] Kępa, Zwycięzców 39>’From (controlled) accident to accident’):

This event took place on 16 March 1960 at 10.10 p.m., when Polish Radio 3 broadcast a programme featuring the music of John Cage as part of the series Music Horizons.

Here is but one of a number of Lutosławski’s more positive public responses to Cage’s liberating significance:

[…] I heard on the radio a short fragment of John Cage’s second Piano Concerto [i.e., Concert for Piano and Orchestra]. The use of the element of chance opened for me a way to use a lot of musical ideas, that were kept ‘in stock’ in my imagination without any way to use them. It was not a direct influence of Cage’s music, but the impulse, which enabled me to use my own possibilities. So I wrote to him that he was a spark thrown on a barrel of gunpowder inside me.

(‘Sound Language’, unpublished and undated typescript in English, included in
Zbigniew Skowron, Lutosławski on Music, Lanham MD, 2007, p.99)

Filed under Lutosławski, Music post-1937, Websites, WL100 Tagged with diary, Gry weneckie, Jeux vénitiens, John Cage, Lutosławski, notebook, WL100, Zapiski, zeszyt

• New app: Lutosławski Guide to Warsaw

Tuesday, 12 March 2013 Leave a comment

News has just come through that two of the three app. platforms (IoS and Android) are now up and running for the Witold Lutosławski Guide to Warsaw. It’s available in Polish or English. There’s a very helpful website which tells you all about this inventive app., which is one of the more unusual ways that the Poles have come up with to celebrate the centenary of Lutosławski’s birth. I wonder what he’d make of it.

To obtain further information on the IoS, Android and Windows versions of the app., click on this link to Przewodnik po Warszawie.

Filed under Lutosławski, Music Dissemination, Music post-1937, Warsaw, Websites Tagged with Guide to Warsaw, Lutosławski, Przewodnik po Warszawie, Warsaw app

• WL100/14: Lutosławski at Polish Radio

Monday, 21 January 2013 Leave a comment

Polish Radio’s new website Witold Lutosławski w Polskim Radiu looks like being one of the most interesting archival sources on the composer so far. There are audio files and photo galleries connected with Lutosławski’s work at Polish Radio in the 1940s and 50s as well as a host of radio interviews made with and about him over the years. The initial on-screen teething problems have now been sorted, although the promised English-language transcripts of some of the items have yet to materialise.

The contents are already of considerable interest, and I hope they will be added to in the coming weeks and months. Currently the contents include:

• over thirty radio reminiscences and interviews
• two examples of incidental music for Polish Radio Theatre unheard since the mid-1950s
• three photo galleries: Witold Lutosławski and His Time (52 items), From the Family Album (22) and Documents from Polish Radio (17)

For those who don’t understand Polish, the second and third groups above may be of the greatest interest.

Incidental Music

Polish Radio has unearthed two sequences of Lutosławski’s incidental music for Polish Radio Theatre. This activity was one which he pursued from the late 1940s until 1960. Little has been written on his incidental music because it was thought that it existed, if at all, almost exclusively in score form. Polish Radio has now released these two audio compilations from its sound archives.

The earlier of the two is called Anccasin ef Nocolette on the PR website. I must admit that I cannot rationalise the language nor find any source for this title. Martina Homma has identified the item as Okassen i Mikołajka, which seems linguistically more reliable. She dates the broadcast of this authorless text to 8 November 1954 (eighteen days before the premiere of the Concerto for Orchestra). Although the PR site gives the duration of the music as 5’39”, it lasts for 11’17”. The music is Baroque pastiche, the fragments up until 08’50” for harpsichord alone. Thereafter, a flute and violin join in. I wonder if Lutosławski was himself playing the keyboard. The recording is rather basic and the performance is not without the occasional fluff.

The second of the two sequences was broadcast almost three months later, on 30 January 1955. It was composed for one of the Arabic folk tales from Klechdy sezamowe (Tales of Sesame, 1913) by Stanisław Leśmian, who is better known by his first forename, Bolesław. The music for Zeklęty rumak (PR site), or O zaklętym rumaku (Homma), is more fantastic and richly scored, for chamber ensemble, than the frankly boring music for the earlier piece. It lasts for 10’27” (the PR site says 5’14”). Let’s hope there are more riches in the sound archives from Lutosławski’s prolific period as a composer of incidental music.

Photo Galleries

There are many unfamiliar items here, so these three sections present new windows into the past. The third section of documents is perhaps the least interesting as it draws on administrative paperwork from the post-war decade. The second section of family photographs consists almost entirely of old images of the Lutosławski family rather than of the composer. His likeness to his brother Jerzy and his father Józef is very striking.

It is the first section that brings Lutosławski really to life, with photographs dating from after the Second World War up until 1993. I was thrilled to see the sequence of photos from the rehearsals and concert for the full premiere of the Second Symphony, which Lutosławski conducted in Katowice in 1967. There are also black and white stills from the documentary film made by Krzysztof Zanussi in 1990 for the BBC (see my post WL100/13: In Conversation with Zanussi).

But for me it’s the first two photographs which I find utterly compelling. They were evidently taken during the same photo shoot (PR indicates that this was in January 1946) as another image used on the front cover of Polish Radio’s listings magazine Radio i Świat in April 1948 (see the top illustration in Panel 2: 1946-49 Music for Radio from my exhibition ‘The Hidden Composer’). Of these two new images, which are technically much better than the one reproduction that I found, it is the first which I find almost unbearably haunting.

Filed under Audio, Lutosławski, Music Dissemination, Music post-1937, Radio, Websites, WL100 Tagged with Lutosławski, Polish Radio, WL100

• Lutosławski Centenary Week in Poland

Monday, 21 January 2013 Leave a comment

I thought it might be of interest to show how Poland is celebrating Lutosławski’s centenary in its concerts over the coming seven days. I’ve drawn my information mainly from the official Lutosławski Year website, 100/100 Lutosławski. The site is now much more populated with events and information than it was when it was launched a month ago, so it’s well worth a visit.

Monday, 21 January 2013

Łódż
The Łódż PO’s January with Lutosławski festival begins with a talk by the President of the Witold Lutosławski Society, Grzegorz Michalski.

Tuesday, 22 January 2013

Łódż
January with Lutosławski continues with events around the String Quartet and the composer’s approach to the psychology of listening.

Warsaw
Concert by the National Philharmonic CO, conducted by Jakub Chrenowicz: Lutosławski Preludes and Fugue, Panufnik Violin Concerto (Isabelle van Keulen) and Beethoven Grosse Fuge (orch. Weingartner)

Thursday, 24 January 2013

Łódż
‘Sunspots’, a contemporary realisation of popular songs that Lutosławski wrote in 1957-63 under the pseudonym ‘Derwid’, by the composer and singer Agata Zubel and the cellist Andrzej Bauer, with electronics by Cezary Duchnowski and Ewa Guziołek-Tubelewicz. This looks absolutely fascinating, and if I weren’t scheduled to be in Warsaw I’d certainly want to be at this concert and the post-concert discussion.

Warsaw
Chain X festival (24 January – 9 February)
Opening concert by AUKSO CO, conducted by Marek Moś: Lutosławski Funeral Music, ‘The Sea’ from Five Songs (Roksana Wardenga), Grave (Marcin Zdunik) and Paroles tissées (Marcel Beekman), plus poetry by Valéry, Michaux and Nowid (Maja Komorowska).
Streamed live at 18.30 GMT on http://www.worldconcerthall.com via Polish Radio Dwójka.

Wrocław
Concert by the Lutosławski Quartet of Wrocław with Garrick Ohlsson: Lutosławski String Quartet and Bartók Piano Quintet.

Friday, 25 January 2013 – Centenary Day

Katowice
Concert by National SO of Polish Radio, conducted by Alexander Liebreich: Lutosławski Symphony no.4, Cello Concerto (Miklós Perényi) and Concerto for Orchestra.
Streamed live at 18.30 GMT on http://www.worldconcerthall.com via Polish Radio Dwójka.

Łódż
A lunchtime discussion on the Cello Concerto between the cellists Tomasz Daroch and Andrzej Bauer and the conductor Joshua Dos Santos.
Evening concert: Gershwin Cuban Overture, Lutosławski Cello Concerto (Tomasz Daroch) and Brahms Symphony no.2.

Warsaw
Inaugural concert of Lutosławski Year
National PO, conducted by Antoni Wit: Szymański Sostenuto (premiere), Lutosławski Symphony no.3 and Partita-Interlude-Chain 2 (Anne-Sophie Mutter).

Wrocław
Concert by the Lutosławski PO of Wrocław, conducted by Jacek Kaspszyk: Lutosławski Fanfare for Louisville, Piano Concerto (Garrick Ohlsson), Stravinsky Firebird Suite and Ravel La Valse. This concert will be repeated in Warsaw on Monday 28 January.

Saturday, 26 January 2013

Katowice
Concert by Silesian PO, conducted by Wojciech Michniewski: Lutosławski Funeral Music, Piano Concerto (Beata Bilińska) and Symphony no.3.

Łódż
Concert by the Lublin PO: Lutosławski Partita-Interlude-Chain 2 (Krzysztof Jakowicz) and Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances, with post-concert reminiscences of Lutosławski by Jakowicz.

Sunday, 27 January 2013

Warsaw
Concert by Polish Radio SO, conducted by Łukasz Borowicz: Lutosławski Little Suite (original version for chamber orchestra), Penderecki Piano Concerto (Florian Uhlig) and Stravinsky Symphony in C. In all the flurry of Lutosławski activity, we mustn’t forget that 2013 marks the 80th anniversary of the births of Krzysztof Penderecki (23 November) and Henryk Mikołaj Górecki (6 December).
Streamed live at 18.30 GMT on http://www.worldconcerthall.com via Polish Radio Dwójka.

Filed under Concerts, Lutosławski, Music Dissemination, Music post-1937, Other Festivals, Radio, Websites Tagged with January 2013, Lutosławski Centenary, Poland

• William Hughes completes his Szymanowski

Friday, 11 January 2013 Leave a comment

It is almost five months since I last posted links to William Hughes’s invaluable English translations of Polish articles on Szymanowski (The Chronicles of Dr Hughes), the vast majority of them from 1937-38. Since then, he has posted 68 more, making a final total of over 130 translations. This has been a mammoth task, undertaken with love and care as well as from a burning desire to share these important documents with a wider audience. I hope that his efforts will one day be rewarded with a hard-copy publication, so if you appreciate his extraordinarily selfless achievement and agree with me about wanting to see this material in print, do let him know. He has redesigned his website so that is is easy to scroll through the summaries and click for the full articles. He’s also added images to many of the items.

It’s superfluous for me to itemise these documents as in my previous posts, so it gives me great pleasure to direct you straight to his own site: http://drwilliamhughes.blogspot.co.uk/. Bravo, William!

Filed under Books & Articles, Music Dissemination, Music pre-1938, Szymanowski, Websites Tagged with Szymanowski, The Chronicles of Doctor Hughes, translations, William Hughes

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