From Chopin to Komeda

Artists:

• Paweł Kowalski - piano (the commentator of the XIXth Chopin Competition)
• Prima Vista String Quartet
  • Krzysztof Bzówka - violin
  • Jakub Grott - violin
  • Marek Czech - viola
  • Tomasz Błaszczak - violoncello

Program:

• Frédéric Chopin - Andante spianato et grande polonaise brillante in E-flat major, Op. 22
• Frédéric Chopin - Nocturne in C-sharp minor, Op. posth.
• Frédéric Chopin - Ballade No.1 in G minor, Op. 23
• Frédéric Chopin - Waltz in A minor, Op. posth.
• Jerzy Maksymiuk - Waltz
• Frédéric Chopin - Waltz in C-sharp minor, Op. 64 No. 2
• Wojciech Kilar - Waltz from the movie “The Promised Land”
• Frédéric Chopin - Waltz in D-flat major, Op. 64, No. 1
• Wojciech Kilar - music from the film ”The Shadow-Line”
• Wojciech Kilar - music from the film ”Blind Chance”
• Wojciech Kilar - music from the film ”Death and the Maiden”
• Krzysztof Komeda - „Sleep Safe and Warm” from the film ”Rosemary’s baby”
• Frédéric Chopin - Larghetto from the Piano Concerto No. 2 in F minor, Op. 21 (Janusz Olejniczak in memoriam)

BREAK

• Juliusz Zarębski – Piano Quintet in G Minor, Op. 34
  • Allegro
  • Adagio
  • Scherzo, Presto
  • Finale, Presto

The Lions Club Łódź has the pleasure to invite you for an exceptional evening with film music. The program will include a selection of the most beautiful pieces by Frédéric Chopin which were part of Roman Polanski’s masterpiece ”The Pianist” awarded with numerous Oscars and a Golden Palm award. Other than this we will hear four compositions by Wojciech Kilar – a composer who connected the worlds of film and classical music. Two of them are important for the history of Łódź Cinema – the rousing waltz will invoke the splendor of the manufacturers’ palaces in which the plot of Andrzej Wajda’s ”The Promised Land” takes place, while the music from Kieślowski’s ”Blind Chance” will evoke the memory of the iconic scene with Bogusław Linda on the Łódź Fabryczna railway station. Apart from this, we will hear Kilar’s music from the films ”The Shadow-Line” (directed by Andrzej Wajda), ”Death and the Maiden” (directed by Roman Polanski) and Krzysztof Komeda’s lullaby from ”Rosemary’s baby” (directed by Roman Polanski). The Waltz by Jerzy Maksymiuk will come into dialogue with the work of Kilar.

The program will be completed by the music of Juliusz Zarębski – the XIXth century master of the keyboard. Today the artist is known mainly from his brilliant piano pieces that betray inspiration taken from the music of Chopin. This time we will hear his G Minor Quintet, which is considered a remarkable work equal to the best quintets of Johannes Brahms and Antonín Dvořák.

The piano part will be played by Paweł Kowalski, a versatile pianist whose accomplishments include performing in Europe’s most prestigious concert halls such as Salle Pleyel in Paris, Konzerthaus in Berlin and the Tonhalle in Zurich. Kowalski was the second instrumentalist who performed Witold Lutosławski’s piano concerto (the first was Krystian Zimmerman), which he played under the baton of the composer himself. The Polish television viewers could recently hear his analysis as the inquisitive commentator of the XIXth Chopin Piano Competition. Kowalski will be accompanied by the Vista String Quartet – an ensemble founded by the musicians of Jerzy Maksymiuk’s Polish Chamber Orchestra, which has been performing diverse repertoire around the world for the three past decades.

The revenue from the event will be earmarked for another editions of scholarships for the gifted youth of the schools of Łódź and Pabianice.

Top photo: Paweł Kowalski, promotional materials of the artist