The Ludwig van Beethoven Easter Festival, which takes place every year in the Polish capital in the run-up to Easter, kicked off with the composer’s Ninth Symphony on Sunday.
The piece was performed by the Orchestra of the National Music Forum (NFM) in the southwestern city of Wrocław, the Kraków Philharmonic Choir and international soloists, including Chen Reiss (soprano), Sarah Romberger (mezzo-soprano), Sung Min Song (tenor), and Jan Martiník (baritone), under the baton of acclaimed conductor Christoph Eschenbach.
Born in Wrocław (then Breslau) in 1940, Eschenbach is the music director of the city’s National Music Forum.
Monday’s and Tuesday’s programme focuses on chamber music, with a recital by French pianist Lucas Debargue and a concert by the Orava Quartet from Australia with Polish pianist Łukasz Krupiński.
Founded by Polish violinist Daniel Kowalik and his brother Karol, a cellist, the Orava Quartet takes its name from the title of one of the most popular works by Polish composer Wojciech Kilar, who drew heavily on Polish highland music.
The Beethoven Easter Festival, now in its 29th edition, was founded by Elżbieta Penderecka, the wife of Krzysztof Penderecki, the famous Polish composer who died in 2020.
The motto of this year’s event is "Beethoven and great poetry," with the programme of the symphonic and chamber concerts, as well as song and piano recitals focusing on the musical legacy of Beethoven, Liszt, Mahler, Richard Strauss, Ravel, Schumann and Penderecki—inspired by literary works.
The final concert of the festival, which is traditionally held on Good Friday, is to bring together two settings of the Jewish prayer in memory of the dead: Leonard Bernstein’s Kaddish and Krzysztof Penderecki’s Kadysz.
The large performance forces include the Orchestra and Chorus of the Warsaw Philharmonic, the Alla Polacca youth choir, soprano Natalia Rubiś, cantor Gerard Edery, and narrators Leah Pisar-Haas and Sławomir Holland, with Germany’s Christoph Koenig conducting.
Based in Warsaw, the Beethoven Easter Festival is not confined to the capital city, with chamber concerts scheduled across Poland, in cities such as Katowice, Wrocław, Sopot, Jelenia Góra, Radom, Kazimierz Dolny and Starachowice.
The festival programme also includes an exhibition of musical manuscripts at the Library of the Jagiellonian University in Kraków and an academic conference with the participation of musicologists from Poland, the United States, Britain, Austria, Germany, Denmark and Spain.
(mk/gs)