The concert of the NFM Wrocław Philharmonic conducted by Jacek Kaspszyk is dedicated to the memory of Andrzej Markowski on the centenary of his birth. The figure of this conductor and composer is inextricably linked with Wrocław, and the artist’s legacy endures to this day. After all, he was the creator and long-time director of the International Festival Wratislavia Cantans. He was also a laureate of the French phonographic award Grand Prix du Disque Charles Cros for his recording of Krzysztof Penderecki's Utrenia, and a two-time winner of the Orpheus Award, awarded since 1963 for outstanding performances at the Warsaw Autumn Festival.

“The whole thing is terribly fantastic and unexpected” is how Karol Szymanowski summed up his Violin Concerto No. 1 in a letter to a friend. This work was written in the autumn of 1916 in Zarudzie, in present day’s Ukraine. The composer was assisted in the work on the solo part by his friend, violinist Paweł Kochański, to whom  the composition was dedicated. The concerto had to wait eight years for its performance – it was premiered in Warsaw in November 1922. In it, Szymanowski radically departed from the Romantic tradition and conventional harmony in favour of searching for a new style and manner of expression. The result was a fairy-tale and dreamlike work, about which one of the critics wrote as follows: “written very freely, with extraordinary variety, full of unexpected combinations, rich and lively, it interested me very much. The orchestra was entrusted with a picturesque and descriptive role here; the violin with lyrical singing. Sound waves flood the soloist’s subtle melody, surrounded by harp cascades, the clarinets and oboes argue fiercely. One could say that the landscape changes every moment, as in a film.” During the concert at the NFM, the solo part will be performed by Finnish violinist Elina Vähälä, who has been promoting Szymanowski’s music for many years.

Both areas of repertoire represented in the concert programme – Karol Szymanowski’s work and French music – were highly valued by Andrzej Markowski. Looking at his rich biography on the centenary of his birth, it is difficult to name an aspect of ​​musical life in our country in which he was not involved: as a conductor performing all over the world, who gave countless first performances at Warsaw Autumn, thus practically co-creating the canon of 20th-century music, and as a composer of music for over thirty motion pictures. In Kraków, he served as artistic director of the philharmonic, initiated the Musica Antiqua et Nova festival and organised the Kraków Spring of Young Musicians. And then came the time for Wrocław – leading the Wrocław Philharmonic, building its new seat and establishing Wratislavia Cantans. Just as Orpheus’s lyre, suspended in the sky in the form of a constellation, accompanies us to this day, so the entire contemporary musical life in Poland does not allow us to forget the outstanding figure of Andrzej Markowski.