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Tag: Andrzej Panufnik

Andrzej Panufnik Rediscovering a Polish Giant

Andrzej Panufnik is the sleeping giant of Polish music. He’s one of those figures, like Bohuslav Martinu, who always seems poised on the verge of greatness, and yet never quite achieves the full degree of recognition he deserves.

To begin with, his particular brand of modernism was eclipsed by the avant-garde experiments of his friend and compatriot, Witold Lutoslawski. Panufnik’s relationship with Lutoslawski dated back to the war years. During the Nazi occupation, the two formed a piano duo that played in Warsaw cafés – at the time the only way to share live music in public, since there was a ban on organized gatherings.

In the meantime, Panufnik quietly produced subversive works celebrating Polish heroism and the resistance. Following the war, he was instrumental in the re-establishment of the Warsaw Philharmonic. However, increasing friction with Poland’s communist regime led to the composer’s defection, under hair-raising circumstances, in 1954. He was granted asylum in England, where he received a knighthood in 1991, the year of his death.

This week on “The Lost Chord,” we’ll pay tribute to Panufnik with two of his ten symphonies, both of them markedly “Polish” in character.

His “Sinfonia Rustica” (1948, revised in 1955), as the title implies, is a work very much of the people, making use of fragmented Polish themes, meant to reflect the rustic, semi-abstract, paper-cut art of the peasantry. Not only the symphony’s framework, but also the layout of the orchestra, is meant to reflect the symmetry found in Polish folk art. Nevertheless, despite the work’s direct character, it was denounced in 1949 as “alien to the great socialist era.”

Whenever I listen to Panufnik’s “Sinfonia Sacra” (1963), I always think of Henryk Sienkiewicz’s 1884 epic, “With Fire and Sword,” set in the 17th century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth during the Khmelnytsky Uprising. With its evocation of winged hussars in courageous battle against the Cossacks, Sienkiewicz’s monumental page-turner whipped readers living in a partitioned Poland into a patriotic fervor.

Conceived as a tribute to Poland’s millennium of Christianity and statehood, the symphony reflects the composer’s religious and patriotic sentiments. Panufnik based the work on the first known hymn in the Polish language, “Bogurodzica.” Throughout the Middle Ages, this served as something of a national anthem, sung not only in the church, but also on the battlefields by Polish knights.

Watch your toes – the giant stirs! Join me for two symphonies by Andrzej Panufnik, on “Andrzej the Giant,” on “The Lost Chord,” now in syndication on KWAX, the radio station of the University of Oregon!

Remember, KWAX is on the West Coast, so there’s a three-hour difference for the Trenton-Princeton area. Here are the respective air-times of my recorded shows (with East Coast conversions in parentheses):

PICTURE PERFECT, the movie music show – Friday on KWAX at 5:00 PACIFIC TIME (8:00 PM EDT)

THE LOST CHORD, unusual and neglected rep – Saturday on KWAX at 4:00 PACIFIC TIME (7:00 PM EDT)

Stream them here!

https://kwax.uoregon.edu/

October 7, 2023
Bernard Jacobson Philadelphia Music World Mourns

An eminent musicologist and critic has died. Bernard Jacobson was a familiar presence in Philadelphia. During the Muti years, when he was probably my age or younger, he was a program annotator for the Philadelphia Orchestra. He also founded a chamber music series and initiated pre-concert talks. Furthermore, he very much had Muti’s ear as an advisor, so that it’s difficult to say how much he may have influenced what trickled down to audiences at the Academy of Music. On one occasion, he appeared as narrator with members of the orchestra, delivering his own translation of Stravinsky’s “L’Histoire du soldat.”

Later in life, he regularly attended concerts of the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, to whom he generously donated program notes. He showed a marked preference for the French form of Mozart’s middle name, Amadé.

His accomplishments extended far beyond the City of Brotherly Love. You can read more about him here:

http://www.musicweb-international.com/contrib/Bernard_Jacobson.htm

I just put in an order for his book on “Polish Renaissance” composers Andrzej Panufnik, Witold Lutoslawski, Krzysztof Penderecki, and Henryk Górecki.

Jacobson was 85 years-old.

Jacobson recites Schoenberg’s “Ode to Napoleon” in 1968

(1/2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcthBF0X9RU

(2/2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KsGXdBP_c30

February 16, 2022
Andrzej Panufnik Rediscovering a Polish Master

Andrzej Panufnik is the sleeping giant of Polish music. He’s one of those figures, like Bohuslav Martinu, who always seems poised on the verge of greatness, and yet never quite achieves the full degree of recognition he deserves.

To begin with, his particular brand of modernism was eclipsed by the avant-garde experiments of his friend and compatriot, Witold Lutoslawski. Panufnik’s relationship with Lutoslawski dated back to the war years. During the Nazi occupation, the two formed a piano duo that played in Warsaw cafés – at the time the only way to share live music in public, since there was a ban on organized gatherings.

In the meantime, Panufnik quietly produced subversive works celebrating Polish heroism and the resistance. Following the war, he was instrumental in the re-establishment of the Warsaw Philharmonic. However, increasing friction with Poland’s communist regime led to the composer’s defection, under hair-raising circumstances, in 1954. He was granted asylum in England, where he received a knighthood in 1991, the year of his death.

This Sunday night on “The Lost Chord,” we’ll pay tribute to Panufnik with two of his ten symphonies, both of them markedly “Polish” in character.

His “Sinfonia Rustica” (1948, revised in 1955), as the title implies, is a work very much of the people, making use of fragmented Polish themes, meant to reflect the rustic, semi-abstract, paper-cut art of the peasantry. Not only the symphony’s framework, but also the layout of the orchestra, is meant to reflect the symmetry found in Polish folk art. Nevertheless, despite the work’s direct character, it was denounced in 1949 as “alien to the great socialist era.”

Whenever I listen to Panufnik’s “Sinfonia Sacra” (1963), I always think of Henryk Sienkiewicz’s 1884 epic, “With Fire and Sword,” set in the 17th century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth during the Khmelnytsky Uprising. With its evocation of winged hussars in courageous battle against the Cossacks, Sienkiewicz’s monumental page-turner whipped readers living in a partitioned Poland into a patriotic fervor.

Conceived as a tribute to Poland’s millennium of Christianity and statehood, the symphony reflects the composer’s religious and patriotic sentiments. Panufnik based the work on the first known hymn in the Polish language, “Bogurodzica.” Throughout the Middle Ages, this served as something of a national anthem, sung not only in the church, but also on the battlefields by Polish knights.

Watch your toes – the giant stirs! Join me for two symphonies by Andrzej Panufnik, on “Andrzej the Giant,” this Sunday night at 10:00 EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

October 3, 2021
Panufnik Wonder Woman’s Lost Anthem?

This guy thinks Andrzej Panufnik’s “Sinfonia Rustica” should have been used in “Wonder Woman.”

Hear the complete symphony on this, Panufnik’s birthday, coming up in the 5:00 hour EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

September 24, 2018
Panufnik, Nelhýbel & Rutter: Rediscovering Masters

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Andrzej Panufnik (1914-1991) is the sleeping giant of Polish music. He’s one of those figures, like Bohuslav Martinu, who always seems perched on the verge of greatness, and yet never quite achieves the full degree of recognition he deserves.

To begin with, his particular brand of modernism was eclipsed by the avant-garde experiments of his compatriot and friend, Witold Lutoslawski. Panufnik’s relationship with Lutoslawski dated back to the war years. During the German occupation, the two formed a piano duo which played in Warsaw cafes – at the time the only way to share live music in public, since there was a ban on organized gatherings.

In the meantime, Panufnik quietly produced subversive works celebrating Polish heroism and the resistance. Following the war, he was instrumental in the re-establishment of the Warsaw Philharmonic. However, increasing friction with Poland’s communist regime led to the composer’s defection, under hair-raising circumstances, in 1954. He was granted asylum in England, where he received a knighthood in the year of his death.

Panufnik’s “Sinfonia Rustica,” composed in 1948 and revised in 1955, as the title implies, is a work very much of the people, making use of fragmented Polish themes, meant to reflect the rustic, semi-abstract, paper-cut art of the peasantry. Not only the symphony’s framework, but also the layout of the orchestra, is meant to reflect the symmetry found in Polish folk art. Nevertheless, despite the work’s direct character, it was denounced in 1949 as “alien to the great socialist era.”

The Czech composer Václav Nelhýbel (1919-1996) was also displaced. Nelhybel left Nazi-occupied Prague for Switzerland in 1942. Later, he settled in the United States, where he taught at Lowell State College. He also served as composer-in-residence at the University of Scranton for several years until his death. During his time in America, he oversaw many bands and youth ensembles. He is remembered as an energetic and demanding though ultimately endearing taskmaster.

Nelhýbel was dizzyingly prolific, with 400 published works to his credit and an additional 200 left in manuscript. The “Etude Symphonique” of 1964 is as exacting and propulsive as the artist who created it, with a three-note motive exhaustively developed. The work’s churning rhythms and cross-rhythms lend it a sense of vitality, and new ideas are continually formulated and examined.

Of a more reflective nature is John Rutter’s Requiem. Rutter (b. 1945) is best known for his all-pervasive music for Christmas. His setting of the Requiem, composed in 1985, eschews the terror and high drama of Berlioz and Verdi to offer solace and tranquility in the manner of Gabriel Fauré’s most beloved essay in the form. I think you’ll find it the perfect restorative music for an early autumn evening.

Works by these three composers will form the loom upon which I hope to weave a compelling program for your late September satisfaction, today from 4 to 7 p.m. EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

Clockwise from left: Andrzej the Giant; Vaclav the Vital; and John the Rejuvenator

September 24, 2018

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