572212 bk Penderecki US_572212 bk Penderecki US 06/12/2011 13:57 Page 5

Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra Antoni Wit

The Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Antoni Wit, one of the most highly regarded Polish conductors, studied PENDERECKI

Photo: A. & J. Deluga-Góra

Orchestra draws upon the rich and old conducting with Henryk Czyz at the Academy of Music in  Kraków. He
tradition whereby individual artists from the then continued his musical studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. He also
full Warsaw Philharmonic would get together
to make their own chamber music. The first
graduated in law at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. Immediately
after completing his studies he was engaged as an assistant at the Sinfoniettas • Oboe Capriccio
chamber ensembles were formed at the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra by Witold Rowicki. After winning second
beginning of the twentieth century. In the
1960s and 1970s, the National Philharmonic
prize in the International Herbert von Karajan Conducting Competition in
Berlin (1971), he became an assistant conductor to the patron of that
Three Pieces in Old Style • Serenade • Intermezzo
Chamber Musicians ensemble under Karol competition. Later he was appointed conductor of the Poznań
Teutsch achieved success playing concerts Philharmonic, collaborated with the Warsaw Grand Theatre, and from Artur Pachlewski, Clarinet • Jean-Louis Capezzali, Oboe
worldwide. Other ensembles made up of 1974 to 1977 was artistic director of the Pomeranian Philharmonic, before
musicians from the Warsaw Philharmonic
also gained international recognition. In the
his appointment as director of the Polish Radio and Television Orchestra
and Chorus in Kraków, from 1977 to 1983. From 1983 to 2000 he was
Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra • Antoni Wit

Photo: Krzysztof Niesporek

1990s the string ensemble gave concerts with managing and artistic director of the National Polish Radio Symphony
eminent soloists such as Konstanty A. Kulka Orchestra in Katowice, and from 1987 to 1992 he was the chief conductor
and Nigel Kennedy, making records and TV and then first guest conductor of the Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran
programmes. During the celebration of the Canaria. In 2002 he became managing and artistic director of the
Warsaw Philharmonic’s centenary, the Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra was reactivated under the patronage Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir. Since the season 2010/11,
of Antoni Wit. The ensemble consists of leading instrumentalists from the Warsaw Philharmonic, including former he has been first guest conductor with the Orquesta Sinfónica de Navarra
members of Karol Teutsch’s ensemble. The artistic director of the orchestra is Jan Lewtak, who graduated from the F. in Pamplona. His international career has brought engagements with
Chopin Music Academy in Warsaw after violin studies under Zenon Brzewski and Mirosław Ławrynowicz. The winner of major orchestras throughout Europe, the Americas and the Near and Far
several violin competitions and of the Radio and Television Committee Award, he has already made a significant East. He has made over 200 records, including an acclaimed release for
contribution to chamber music in Poland. Naxos of the piano concertos of Prokofiev, awarded the Diapason d’Or and Grand Prix du Disque de la Nouvelle
Académie du Disque. In January 2002 his recording of the Turangalîla Symphony by Olivier Messiaen (8.554478-79)
Violin I Violin II Viola Cello was awarded the Cannes Classical Award at MIDEM Classic 2002. In 2004 he received the Classical Internet Award.
Jan Lewtak Marian Kowalski Marek Iwański Kazimierz Koślacz He has completed for Naxos a CD series of Szymanowski’s symphonic and large-scale vocal-instrumental works, each
(Soloist on 5 6 8 @ #) Anna Bednarczyk (Soloist on 8 @) (Soloist on 6 7 8 @) rated among ‘discs of the month’ by CD magazines (Gramophone, BBC Music Magazine). He also received the Record
Marcin Mazurek Magdalena Smoczyńska Ryszard Groblewski Angelica Wais Academy Award 2005 of Japanese music magazine Record Geijutsu for Penderecki’s Polish Requiem (Naxos), and
Krystyna Wilczyńska Paweł Rybkowski (Soloist on 6) Andrzej Wiltos four Fryderyk Awards of the Polish Phonographic Academy. He has received six GRAMMY ® nominations for
Marek Powideł Marzena Dopytalska-Sójka Krzysztof Szczepański Piotr Sapilak Penderecki’s St Luke Passion in 2004 (8.557149), A Polish Requiem in 2005 (8.557386-87), Seven Gates of Jerusalem
Piotr Tadzik Grzegorz Groblewski Jacek Toczyski in 2007 (8.557766), Utrenja in 2009 (8.572031) and Karol Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater in 2008 (8.570724) and
Agnieszka Lewandowska Jan Aniołek Agnieszka Duź-Dymus Double bass Symphonies Nos. 1 and 4 in 2009 (8.570722). In 2010 Antoni Wit won the annual award of the Karol Szymanowski
Grzegorz Osiński Katarzyna Borzucka Janusz Długokęcki Foundation for his promotion of the music of Szymanowski in his Naxos recordings. Antoni Wit is professor at the
Dobrosława Siudmak-Nur Barbara Duda-Szproch Marcin Wiliński Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw.

8.572212 5 6 8.572212
572212 bk Penderecki US_572212 bk Penderecki US 06/12/2011 13:57 Page 2
Krzysztof Penderecki (b. 1933): Three Pieces in Old Style • Serenade
Intermezzo • Sinfoniettas Nos. 1 and 2 • Capriccio for Oboe and Strings
Kryzsztof Penderecki was born in Dubica, a small town
between Kraków and L’vov, and studied at Kraków’s
Academy of Music and Jagiellonian University. He first
established himself at the Warsaw Autumn Festivals of
1959 and 1960. Quickly becoming part of the European
avant-garde, he achieved fame with his Threnody [Naxos
8.554491] in which he imparted a keen expressivity to his
then ‘sonorist’ musical language. The St Luke Passion
[8.557149] proved how successful this idiom could be in
sacred music and he continued to be inspired directly by
such timeless religious themes, as is witnessed by his
cantatas, oratorios and operas.
During the mid-1970s this involvement with tradition
became deeper, Penderecki entering into dialogue with
music that he ‘rediscovered’ for himself. He internalised
the post-Romantic tradition and combined it with the
technical achievements of his earlier music. Major works
written in this new style include concertos for violin
[8.555265], cello and viola [both 8.572211], the Second
Symphony [8.554492], the opera Paradise Lost, the Te
Deum [8.557980] and A Polish Requiem [8.557386/7].
Further formal and stylistic investigation led to the
synthesis of the modern with the traditional. This inspired
operas of stylistic diversity such as the expressionist
Black Mask and the post-modern Ubu Rex. Compositions
drawing on this new aesthetic included Symphonies Nos.
3, 4 and 5 [the latter on 8.554567] and the oratorios
Seven Gates of Jerusalem [8.557766] and Credo
[8.572032], all of these associated with both a condensed
expression as well as a purified array of technical means.
The present disc focusses on Penderecki’s music for
strings, a notable sub-category of his orchestral output
that runs across almost the whole of his composing
career. Together with other of his Polish contemporaries,
he initially deployed strings in terms of their unorthodox
sonorities and ability to create textures no less striking
than those achieved by wind or percussion. Later,
however, re-engagement with earlier musical eras often
found him invoking rather more traditional idioms. The six
8.572212
works featured here extend across a period of over three
decades, and represent each of the main phases with
which the composer has been associated.
Composed as music for the film The Manuscript
Found in Saragossa, the Three Pieces in Old Style (1963)
are instances of a stylistic pastiche that must have
seemed the more disconcerting given Penderecki’s
standing at that time as a leading younger composer of
the European avant-garde, though their recourse to
procedures of that era anticipates the stylistic plurality
such as the composer was to embrace a decade hence.
The opening Aria represents a decidedly late-Romantic
take on its Baroque archetype. There follow two
Menuettos: the first is a lively number of robust rhythms
and engaging humour, while the second is more obviously
related to the original dance measure and is redolent of
the galante style from the late Baroque era.
The two movements of the Serenade (1996-7) were
conceived as well as first performed separately, the first
complete account given by Rudolf Baumgartner with the
Lucerne Festival Strings in Lucerne on 31st August 1997.
It begins with a stern Passacaglia whose progress is
informed by the echoing motif heard at the outset, and
which reappears as the movement nears its emotional
apex before dying away uncertainly. There follows a
Larghetto whose soulful initial bars set the tone for this
study in gravely undulating string textures, at length
reaching a climax thrown into relief by an eloquent violin
solo which returns to the opening introspection.
A transcription of the String Trio, Sinfonietta No. 1
(1992) was first heard in Warsaw on 17th February 1992
with Sinfonia Varsovia conducted by the composer. The
piece falls into two very different movements which,
between them, add up to an unlikely unity whose sum is
nevertheless greater for its overt polarity. It begins with an
Allegro molto whose aggressive opening chords are
contrasted starkly with a lengthy and increasingly
impassioned viola solo. Further alternation of these two
ideas brings about a fugitive motion between groups of
2 3
strings from which various soloists emerge in a subtle
variation of texture, the mood at first calming then
intensifying as the movement drives onward to a brief
climax which is followed by an equivocal close. The
ensuing Vivace is its complement in almost every respect
– the trenchant initial activity opening out into brusque
contrapuntal activity, followed by spectral pizzicato writing
that presages a final headlong surge.
Given its première by the Zurich Chamber Orchestra
with its dedicatee Edmond de Stoutz in Zurich on 30th
November 1973, the Intermezzo for 24 strings (1973) is
among Penderecki’s final works written in the radical idiom
that he had pioneered over the preceding fifteen years –
its sound-world closely related to that of the First
Symphony. The wavering initial gestures gradually merge
into a kaleidoscopic interplay that exploits aspects of
timbre and texture to the full. Near its mid-point the music
takes on greater solidity before suddenly alighting on a
string cluster of great density, soon thinning out to a unison
chord which itself disperses into fragmentary gestures.
The Capriccio for oboe and eleven strings (1964) is
the earliest piece featured on this disc. Given its première
by Heinz Holliger, with the Lucerne Festival Strings and
Rudolf Baumgartner, in Lucerne on 26th August 1965, it
gives evidence of a lighter side to Penderecki’s thinking
found in several instrumental works from the period. The
initial gestures centre on a single note obsessively
repeated by oboe and strings alike, with the latter having
recourse to a wide range of playing techniques. A third of
the way through this dialogue becomes more equable,
oboe having a piquant cadenza that gradually draws
strings back into the fray, but an underlying humour
persists through more confrontational stages to a close
which seems literally to vanish into thin air.
A transcription of the Clarinet Quartet [8.557052],
Sinfonietta No. 2 (1994) received its first hearing in Bad
Kissingen on 13th July 1994 from clarinettist Paul Meyer
with Sinfonia Varsovia conducted by the composer.
Among the most substantial of Penderecki’s later
orchestral works, it unfolds over four highly contrasted
movements. The opening Notturno begins with a plaintive
clarinet solo that becomes even more expressive once
the strings have entered, though the textures remain
sparse right through to the austere final bars. The
Scherzo that follows is set in motion with a pulsating
rhythm that draws clarinet and strings into an animated
though also sardonic dialogue, while the ensuing
Serenade inhabits an unexpectedly neo-classical vein
with the witty play that emerges on its underlying waltz
rhythm. Much the most substantial section, the final
Abschied opens in elegiac uncertainty before it unfolds as
might the slow movement of a full-blown concerto: at one
point a violin ascends to the top of its register, after which
the clarinet continues with a mournful solo that sees the
strings wind down to a point of near stasis – the two ‘solo’
instruments then uncertainly trading gestures over remote
lower strings which presently bring about a calm yet
ultimately unresolved conclusion.
Richard Whitehouse
8.572212
Artur Pachlewski
Artur Pachlewski is among the most outstanding Polish clarinettists of recent years.
Photo: Ewa Mackoś
Colleagues and critics bear witness to his fine technique, great musicality and a
unique versatility that allows him to move freely between classical, romantic and
contemporary music. He completed his studies at the Chopin Accademy of Music in
Warsaw (diploma with distinction), at the European Mozart Accademy and with
Eduard Brunner in Germany, and has appeared as a soloist with Polish and foreign
orchestras in repertoire from Telemann and Mozart to Penderecki. He has also
performed with such chamber music ensembles as the Wilanów, Silesian, Camerata
and Royal String Quartets, the BBC Singers, and Ensemble Ricercare. He has made
recordings for many labels, with releases receiving three nominations for Fryderyk
Awards and the Supersonic Pizzicato Award in Luxembourg. A recording of
Zielinski’s Concerto Inquieto for clarinet and orchestra by the Polish Radio Orchestra
with Artur Pachlewski as soloist is scheduled for release on the Polish Radio label.
www.arturpachlewski.com
Jean-Louis Capezzali
Jean-Louis Capezzali studied at the Versailles Conservatory in France, where he
Photo: Denis Gliksman
received a gold medal and an honour prize. In 1979, after he receiving the National
Certificate of Aptitude to become an oboe professor, he was awarded the position of
Principal Oboe with the Concert Lamoureux Orchestra in Paris. He was a prizewinner
at the Geneva (silver medal, 1982) and Prague (1986) international competitions. In
1984 he was appointed Principal Oboist of the Radio France Philharmonic Orchestra
based in Paris. In 1988 he was named oboe professor at the Paris National
Conservatory of Music, and in the same year he was also appointed oboe professor
at the Lyon National Conservatory of Music where he currently teaches. In 2009, he
was appointed oboe professor at the Haute Ecole of Music in Lausanne. Jean-Louis
Capezzali also enjoys a career as a soloist and chamber musician, appearing with
leading ensembles and performing at music festivals throughout the world. In his
master classes he represents the French School of oboe playing. He has given the
premières of many new contemporary works, including the Chinese composer
Qigang Chen’s Extase which he has recorded for Virgin.
4 8.572212
572212 bk Penderecki US_572212 bk Penderecki US 06/12/2011 13:57 Page 2
Krzysztof Penderecki (b. 1933): Three Pieces in Old Style • Serenade
Intermezzo • Sinfoniettas Nos. 1 and 2 • Capriccio for Oboe and Strings
Kryzsztof Penderecki was born in Dubica, a small town
between Kraków and L’vov, and studied at Kraków’s
Academy of Music and Jagiellonian University. He first
established himself at the Warsaw Autumn Festivals of
1959 and 1960. Quickly becoming part of the European
avant-garde, he achieved fame with his Threnody [Naxos
8.554491] in which he imparted a keen expressivity to his
then ‘sonorist’ musical language. The St Luke Passion
[8.557149] proved how successful this idiom could be in
sacred music and he continued to be inspired directly by
such timeless religious themes, as is witnessed by his
cantatas, oratorios and operas.
During the mid-1970s this involvement with tradition
became deeper, Penderecki entering into dialogue with
music that he ‘rediscovered’ for himself. He internalised
the post-Romantic tradition and combined it with the
technical achievements of his earlier music. Major works
written in this new style include concertos for violin
[8.555265], cello and viola [both 8.572211], the Second
Symphony [8.554492], the opera Paradise Lost, the Te
Deum [8.557980] and A Polish Requiem [8.557386/7].
Further formal and stylistic investigation led to the
synthesis of the modern with the traditional. This inspired
operas of stylistic diversity such as the expressionist
Black Mask and the post-modern Ubu Rex. Compositions
drawing on this new aesthetic included Symphonies Nos.
3, 4 and 5 [the latter on 8.554567] and the oratorios
Seven Gates of Jerusalem [8.557766] and Credo
[8.572032], all of these associated with both a condensed
expression as well as a purified array of technical means.
The present disc focusses on Penderecki’s music for
strings, a notable sub-category of his orchestral output
that runs across almost the whole of his composing
career. Together with other of his Polish contemporaries,
he initially deployed strings in terms of their unorthodox
sonorities and ability to create textures no less striking
than those achieved by wind or percussion. Later,
however, re-engagement with earlier musical eras often
found him invoking rather more traditional idioms. The six
8.572212
works featured here extend across a period of over three
decades, and represent each of the main phases with
which the composer has been associated.
Composed as music for the film The Manuscript
Found in Saragossa, the Three Pieces in Old Style (1963)
are instances of a stylistic pastiche that must have
seemed the more disconcerting given Penderecki’s
standing at that time as a leading younger composer of
the European avant-garde, though their recourse to
procedures of that era anticipates the stylistic plurality
such as the composer was to embrace a decade hence.
The opening Aria represents a decidedly late-Romantic
take on its Baroque archetype. There follow two
Menuettos: the first is a lively number of robust rhythms
and engaging humour, while the second is more obviously
related to the original dance measure and is redolent of
the galante style from the late Baroque era.
The two movements of the Serenade (1996-7) were
conceived as well as first performed separately, the first
complete account given by Rudolf Baumgartner with the
Lucerne Festival Strings in Lucerne on 31st August 1997.
It begins with a stern Passacaglia whose progress is
informed by the echoing motif heard at the outset, and
which reappears as the movement nears its emotional
apex before dying away uncertainly. There follows a
Larghetto whose soulful initial bars set the tone for this
study in gravely undulating string textures, at length
reaching a climax thrown into relief by an eloquent violin
solo which returns to the opening introspection.
A transcription of the String Trio, Sinfonietta No. 1
(1992) was first heard in Warsaw on 17th February 1992
with Sinfonia Varsovia conducted by the composer. The
piece falls into two very different movements which,
between them, add up to an unlikely unity whose sum is
nevertheless greater for its overt polarity. It begins with an
Allegro molto whose aggressive opening chords are
contrasted starkly with a lengthy and increasingly
impassioned viola solo. Further alternation of these two
ideas brings about a fugitive motion between groups of
2 3
strings from which various soloists emerge in a subtle
variation of texture, the mood at first calming then
intensifying as the movement drives onward to a brief
climax which is followed by an equivocal close. The
ensuing Vivace is its complement in almost every respect
– the trenchant initial activity opening out into brusque
contrapuntal activity, followed by spectral pizzicato writing
that presages a final headlong surge.
Given its première by the Zurich Chamber Orchestra
with its dedicatee Edmond de Stoutz in Zurich on 30th
November 1973, the Intermezzo for 24 strings (1973) is
among Penderecki’s final works written in the radical idiom
that he had pioneered over the preceding fifteen years –
its sound-world closely related to that of the First
Symphony. The wavering initial gestures gradually merge
into a kaleidoscopic interplay that exploits aspects of
timbre and texture to the full. Near its mid-point the music
takes on greater solidity before suddenly alighting on a
string cluster of great density, soon thinning out to a unison
chord which itself disperses into fragmentary gestures.
The Capriccio for oboe and eleven strings (1964) is
the earliest piece featured on this disc. Given its première
by Heinz Holliger, with the Lucerne Festival Strings and
Rudolf Baumgartner, in Lucerne on 26th August 1965, it
gives evidence of a lighter side to Penderecki’s thinking
found in several instrumental works from the period. The
initial gestures centre on a single note obsessively
repeated by oboe and strings alike, with the latter having
recourse to a wide range of playing techniques. A third of
the way through this dialogue becomes more equable,
oboe having a piquant cadenza that gradually draws
strings back into the fray, but an underlying humour
persists through more confrontational stages to a close
which seems literally to vanish into thin air.
A transcription of the Clarinet Quartet [8.557052],
Sinfonietta No. 2 (1994) received its first hearing in Bad
Kissingen on 13th July 1994 from clarinettist Paul Meyer
with Sinfonia Varsovia conducted by the composer.
Among the most substantial of Penderecki’s later
orchestral works, it unfolds over four highly contrasted
movements. The opening Notturno begins with a plaintive
clarinet solo that becomes even more expressive once
the strings have entered, though the textures remain
sparse right through to the austere final bars. The
Scherzo that follows is set in motion with a pulsating
rhythm that draws clarinet and strings into an animated
though also sardonic dialogue, while the ensuing
Serenade inhabits an unexpectedly neo-classical vein
with the witty play that emerges on its underlying waltz
rhythm. Much the most substantial section, the final
Abschied opens in elegiac uncertainty before it unfolds as
might the slow movement of a full-blown concerto: at one
point a violin ascends to the top of its register, after which
the clarinet continues with a mournful solo that sees the
strings wind down to a point of near stasis – the two ‘solo’
instruments then uncertainly trading gestures over remote
lower strings which presently bring about a calm yet
ultimately unresolved conclusion.
Richard Whitehouse
8.572212
Artur Pachlewski
Artur Pachlewski is among the most outstanding Polish clarinettists of recent years.
Photo: Ewa Mackoś
Colleagues and critics bear witness to his fine technique, great musicality and a
unique versatility that allows him to move freely between classical, romantic and
contemporary music. He completed his studies at the Chopin Accademy of Music in
Warsaw (diploma with distinction), at the European Mozart Accademy and with
Eduard Brunner in Germany, and has appeared as a soloist with Polish and foreign
orchestras in repertoire from Telemann and Mozart to Penderecki. He has also
performed with such chamber music ensembles as the Wilanów, Silesian, Camerata
and Royal String Quartets, the BBC Singers, and Ensemble Ricercare. He has made
recordings for many labels, with releases receiving three nominations for Fryderyk
Awards and the Supersonic Pizzicato Award in Luxembourg. A recording of
Zielinski’s Concerto Inquieto for clarinet and orchestra by the Polish Radio Orchestra
with Artur Pachlewski as soloist is scheduled for release on the Polish Radio label.
www.arturpachlewski.com
Jean-Louis Capezzali
Jean-Louis Capezzali studied at the Versailles Conservatory in France, where he
Photo: Denis Gliksman
received a gold medal and an honour prize. In 1979, after he receiving the National
Certificate of Aptitude to become an oboe professor, he was awarded the position of
Principal Oboe with the Concert Lamoureux Orchestra in Paris. He was a prizewinner
at the Geneva (silver medal, 1982) and Prague (1986) international competitions. In
1984 he was appointed Principal Oboist of the Radio France Philharmonic Orchestra
based in Paris. In 1988 he was named oboe professor at the Paris National
Conservatory of Music, and in the same year he was also appointed oboe professor
at the Lyon National Conservatory of Music where he currently teaches. In 2009, he
was appointed oboe professor at the Haute Ecole of Music in Lausanne. Jean-Louis
Capezzali also enjoys a career as a soloist and chamber musician, appearing with
leading ensembles and performing at music festivals throughout the world. In his
master classes he represents the French School of oboe playing. He has given the
premières of many new contemporary works, including the Chinese composer
Qigang Chen’s Extase which he has recorded for Virgin.
4 8.572212
572212 bk Penderecki US_572212 bk Penderecki US 06/12/2011 13:57 Page 2
Krzysztof Penderecki (b. 1933): Three Pieces in Old Style • Serenade
Intermezzo • Sinfoniettas Nos. 1 and 2 • Capriccio for Oboe and Strings
Kryzsztof Penderecki was born in Dubica, a small town
between Kraków and L’vov, and studied at Kraków’s
Academy of Music and Jagiellonian University. He first
established himself at the Warsaw Autumn Festivals of
1959 and 1960. Quickly becoming part of the European
avant-garde, he achieved fame with his Threnody [Naxos
8.554491] in which he imparted a keen expressivity to his
then ‘sonorist’ musical language. The St Luke Passion
[8.557149] proved how successful this idiom could be in
sacred music and he continued to be inspired directly by
such timeless religious themes, as is witnessed by his
cantatas, oratorios and operas.
During the mid-1970s this involvement with tradition
became deeper, Penderecki entering into dialogue with
music that he ‘rediscovered’ for himself. He internalised
the post-Romantic tradition and combined it with the
technical achievements of his earlier music. Major works
written in this new style include concertos for violin
[8.555265], cello and viola [both 8.572211], the Second
Symphony [8.554492], the opera Paradise Lost, the Te
Deum [8.557980] and A Polish Requiem [8.557386/7].
Further formal and stylistic investigation led to the
synthesis of the modern with the traditional. This inspired
operas of stylistic diversity such as the expressionist
Black Mask and the post-modern Ubu Rex. Compositions
drawing on this new aesthetic included Symphonies Nos.
3, 4 and 5 [the latter on 8.554567] and the oratorios
Seven Gates of Jerusalem [8.557766] and Credo
[8.572032], all of these associated with both a condensed
expression as well as a purified array of technical means.
The present disc focusses on Penderecki’s music for
strings, a notable sub-category of his orchestral output
that runs across almost the whole of his composing
career. Together with other of his Polish contemporaries,
he initially deployed strings in terms of their unorthodox
sonorities and ability to create textures no less striking
than those achieved by wind or percussion. Later,
however, re-engagement with earlier musical eras often
found him invoking rather more traditional idioms. The six
8.572212
works featured here extend across a period of over three
decades, and represent each of the main phases with
which the composer has been associated.
Composed as music for the film The Manuscript
Found in Saragossa, the Three Pieces in Old Style (1963)
are instances of a stylistic pastiche that must have
seemed the more disconcerting given Penderecki’s
standing at that time as a leading younger composer of
the European avant-garde, though their recourse to
procedures of that era anticipates the stylistic plurality
such as the composer was to embrace a decade hence.
The opening Aria represents a decidedly late-Romantic
take on its Baroque archetype. There follow two
Menuettos: the first is a lively number of robust rhythms
and engaging humour, while the second is more obviously
related to the original dance measure and is redolent of
the galante style from the late Baroque era.
The two movements of the Serenade (1996-7) were
conceived as well as first performed separately, the first
complete account given by Rudolf Baumgartner with the
Lucerne Festival Strings in Lucerne on 31st August 1997.
It begins with a stern Passacaglia whose progress is
informed by the echoing motif heard at the outset, and
which reappears as the movement nears its emotional
apex before dying away uncertainly. There follows a
Larghetto whose soulful initial bars set the tone for this
study in gravely undulating string textures, at length
reaching a climax thrown into relief by an eloquent violin
solo which returns to the opening introspection.
A transcription of the String Trio, Sinfonietta No. 1
(1992) was first heard in Warsaw on 17th February 1992
with Sinfonia Varsovia conducted by the composer. The
piece falls into two very different movements which,
between them, add up to an unlikely unity whose sum is
nevertheless greater for its overt polarity. It begins with an
Allegro molto whose aggressive opening chords are
contrasted starkly with a lengthy and increasingly
impassioned viola solo. Further alternation of these two
ideas brings about a fugitive motion between groups of
2 3
strings from which various soloists emerge in a subtle
variation of texture, the mood at first calming then
intensifying as the movement drives onward to a brief
climax which is followed by an equivocal close. The
ensuing Vivace is its complement in almost every respect
– the trenchant initial activity opening out into brusque
contrapuntal activity, followed by spectral pizzicato writing
that presages a final headlong surge.
Given its première by the Zurich Chamber Orchestra
with its dedicatee Edmond de Stoutz in Zurich on 30th
November 1973, the Intermezzo for 24 strings (1973) is
among Penderecki’s final works written in the radical idiom
that he had pioneered over the preceding fifteen years –
its sound-world closely related to that of the First
Symphony. The wavering initial gestures gradually merge
into a kaleidoscopic interplay that exploits aspects of
timbre and texture to the full. Near its mid-point the music
takes on greater solidity before suddenly alighting on a
string cluster of great density, soon thinning out to a unison
chord which itself disperses into fragmentary gestures.
The Capriccio for oboe and eleven strings (1964) is
the earliest piece featured on this disc. Given its première
by Heinz Holliger, with the Lucerne Festival Strings and
Rudolf Baumgartner, in Lucerne on 26th August 1965, it
gives evidence of a lighter side to Penderecki’s thinking
found in several instrumental works from the period. The
initial gestures centre on a single note obsessively
repeated by oboe and strings alike, with the latter having
recourse to a wide range of playing techniques. A third of
the way through this dialogue becomes more equable,
oboe having a piquant cadenza that gradually draws
strings back into the fray, but an underlying humour
persists through more confrontational stages to a close
which seems literally to vanish into thin air.
A transcription of the Clarinet Quartet [8.557052],
Sinfonietta No. 2 (1994) received its first hearing in Bad
Kissingen on 13th July 1994 from clarinettist Paul Meyer
with Sinfonia Varsovia conducted by the composer.
Among the most substantial of Penderecki’s later
orchestral works, it unfolds over four highly contrasted
movements. The opening Notturno begins with a plaintive
clarinet solo that becomes even more expressive once
the strings have entered, though the textures remain
sparse right through to the austere final bars. The
Scherzo that follows is set in motion with a pulsating
rhythm that draws clarinet and strings into an animated
though also sardonic dialogue, while the ensuing
Serenade inhabits an unexpectedly neo-classical vein
with the witty play that emerges on its underlying waltz
rhythm. Much the most substantial section, the final
Abschied opens in elegiac uncertainty before it unfolds as
might the slow movement of a full-blown concerto: at one
point a violin ascends to the top of its register, after which
the clarinet continues with a mournful solo that sees the
strings wind down to a point of near stasis – the two ‘solo’
instruments then uncertainly trading gestures over remote
lower strings which presently bring about a calm yet
ultimately unresolved conclusion.
Richard Whitehouse
8.572212
Artur Pachlewski
Artur Pachlewski is among the most outstanding Polish clarinettists of recent years.
Photo: Ewa Mackoś
Colleagues and critics bear witness to his fine technique, great musicality and a
unique versatility that allows him to move freely between classical, romantic and
contemporary music. He completed his studies at the Chopin Accademy of Music in
Warsaw (diploma with distinction), at the European Mozart Accademy and with
Eduard Brunner in Germany, and has appeared as a soloist with Polish and foreign
orchestras in repertoire from Telemann and Mozart to Penderecki. He has also
performed with such chamber music ensembles as the Wilanów, Silesian, Camerata
and Royal String Quartets, the BBC Singers, and Ensemble Ricercare. He has made
recordings for many labels, with releases receiving three nominations for Fryderyk
Awards and the Supersonic Pizzicato Award in Luxembourg. A recording of
Zielinski’s Concerto Inquieto for clarinet and orchestra by the Polish Radio Orchestra
with Artur Pachlewski as soloist is scheduled for release on the Polish Radio label.
www.arturpachlewski.com
Jean-Louis Capezzali
Jean-Louis Capezzali studied at the Versailles Conservatory in France, where he
Photo: Denis Gliksman
received a gold medal and an honour prize. In 1979, after he receiving the National
Certificate of Aptitude to become an oboe professor, he was awarded the position of
Principal Oboe with the Concert Lamoureux Orchestra in Paris. He was a prizewinner
at the Geneva (silver medal, 1982) and Prague (1986) international competitions. In
1984 he was appointed Principal Oboist of the Radio France Philharmonic Orchestra
based in Paris. In 1988 he was named oboe professor at the Paris National
Conservatory of Music, and in the same year he was also appointed oboe professor
at the Lyon National Conservatory of Music where he currently teaches. In 2009, he
was appointed oboe professor at the Haute Ecole of Music in Lausanne. Jean-Louis
Capezzali also enjoys a career as a soloist and chamber musician, appearing with
leading ensembles and performing at music festivals throughout the world. In his
master classes he represents the French School of oboe playing. He has given the
premières of many new contemporary works, including the Chinese composer
Qigang Chen’s Extase which he has recorded for Virgin.
4 8.572212
572212 bk Penderecki US_572212 bk Penderecki US 06/12/2011 13:57 Page 5

Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra Antoni Wit

The Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Antoni Wit, one of the most highly regarded Polish conductors, studied PENDERECKI

Photo: A. & J. Deluga-Góra

Orchestra draws upon the rich and old conducting with Henryk Czyz at the Academy of Music in  Kraków. He
tradition whereby individual artists from the then continued his musical studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. He also
full Warsaw Philharmonic would get together
to make their own chamber music. The first
graduated in law at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. Immediately
after completing his studies he was engaged as an assistant at the Sinfoniettas • Oboe Capriccio
chamber ensembles were formed at the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra by Witold Rowicki. After winning second
beginning of the twentieth century. In the
1960s and 1970s, the National Philharmonic
prize in the International Herbert von Karajan Conducting Competition in
Berlin (1971), he became an assistant conductor to the patron of that
Three Pieces in Old Style • Serenade • Intermezzo
Chamber Musicians ensemble under Karol competition. Later he was appointed conductor of the Poznań
Teutsch achieved success playing concerts Philharmonic, collaborated with the Warsaw Grand Theatre, and from Artur Pachlewski, Clarinet • Jean-Louis Capezzali, Oboe
worldwide. Other ensembles made up of 1974 to 1977 was artistic director of the Pomeranian Philharmonic, before
musicians from the Warsaw Philharmonic
also gained international recognition. In the
his appointment as director of the Polish Radio and Television Orchestra
and Chorus in Kraków, from 1977 to 1983. From 1983 to 2000 he was
Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra • Antoni Wit

Photo: Krzysztof Niesporek

1990s the string ensemble gave concerts with managing and artistic director of the National Polish Radio Symphony
eminent soloists such as Konstanty A. Kulka Orchestra in Katowice, and from 1987 to 1992 he was the chief conductor
and Nigel Kennedy, making records and TV and then first guest conductor of the Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran
programmes. During the celebration of the Canaria. In 2002 he became managing and artistic director of the
Warsaw Philharmonic’s centenary, the Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra was reactivated under the patronage Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir. Since the season 2010/11,
of Antoni Wit. The ensemble consists of leading instrumentalists from the Warsaw Philharmonic, including former he has been first guest conductor with the Orquesta Sinfónica de Navarra
members of Karol Teutsch’s ensemble. The artistic director of the orchestra is Jan Lewtak, who graduated from the F. in Pamplona. His international career has brought engagements with
Chopin Music Academy in Warsaw after violin studies under Zenon Brzewski and Mirosław Ławrynowicz. The winner of major orchestras throughout Europe, the Americas and the Near and Far
several violin competitions and of the Radio and Television Committee Award, he has already made a significant East. He has made over 200 records, including an acclaimed release for
contribution to chamber music in Poland. Naxos of the piano concertos of Prokofiev, awarded the Diapason d’Or and Grand Prix du Disque de la Nouvelle
Académie du Disque. In January 2002 his recording of the Turangalîla Symphony by Olivier Messiaen (8.554478-79)
Violin I Violin II Viola Cello was awarded the Cannes Classical Award at MIDEM Classic 2002. In 2004 he received the Classical Internet Award.
Jan Lewtak Marian Kowalski Marek Iwański Kazimierz Koślacz He has completed for Naxos a CD series of Szymanowski’s symphonic and large-scale vocal-instrumental works, each
(Soloist on 5 6 8 @ #) Anna Bednarczyk (Soloist on 8 @) (Soloist on 6 7 8 @) rated among ‘discs of the month’ by CD magazines (Gramophone, BBC Music Magazine). He also received the Record
Marcin Mazurek Magdalena Smoczyńska Ryszard Groblewski Angelica Wais Academy Award 2005 of Japanese music magazine Record Geijutsu for Penderecki’s Polish Requiem (Naxos), and
Krystyna Wilczyńska Paweł Rybkowski (Soloist on 6) Andrzej Wiltos four Fryderyk Awards of the Polish Phonographic Academy. He has received six GRAMMY ® nominations for
Marek Powideł Marzena Dopytalska-Sójka Krzysztof Szczepański Piotr Sapilak Penderecki’s St Luke Passion in 2004 (8.557149), A Polish Requiem in 2005 (8.557386-87), Seven Gates of Jerusalem
Piotr Tadzik Grzegorz Groblewski Jacek Toczyski in 2007 (8.557766), Utrenja in 2009 (8.572031) and Karol Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater in 2008 (8.570724) and
Agnieszka Lewandowska Jan Aniołek Agnieszka Duź-Dymus Double bass Symphonies Nos. 1 and 4 in 2009 (8.570722). In 2010 Antoni Wit won the annual award of the Karol Szymanowski
Grzegorz Osiński Katarzyna Borzucka Janusz Długokęcki Foundation for his promotion of the music of Szymanowski in his Naxos recordings. Antoni Wit is professor at the
Dobrosława Siudmak-Nur Barbara Duda-Szproch Marcin Wiliński Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw.

8.572212 5 6 8.572212
572212 bk Penderecki US_572212 bk Penderecki US 06/12/2011 13:57 Page 5

Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra Antoni Wit

The Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Antoni Wit, one of the most highly regarded Polish conductors, studied PENDERECKI

Photo: A. & J. Deluga-Góra

Orchestra draws upon the rich and old conducting with Henryk Czyz at the Academy of Music in  Kraków. He
tradition whereby individual artists from the then continued his musical studies with Nadia Boulanger in Paris. He also
full Warsaw Philharmonic would get together
to make their own chamber music. The first
graduated in law at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. Immediately
after completing his studies he was engaged as an assistant at the Sinfoniettas • Oboe Capriccio
chamber ensembles were formed at the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra by Witold Rowicki. After winning second
beginning of the twentieth century. In the
1960s and 1970s, the National Philharmonic
prize in the International Herbert von Karajan Conducting Competition in
Berlin (1971), he became an assistant conductor to the patron of that
Three Pieces in Old Style • Serenade • Intermezzo
Chamber Musicians ensemble under Karol competition. Later he was appointed conductor of the Poznań
Teutsch achieved success playing concerts Philharmonic, collaborated with the Warsaw Grand Theatre, and from Artur Pachlewski, Clarinet • Jean-Louis Capezzali, Oboe
worldwide. Other ensembles made up of 1974 to 1977 was artistic director of the Pomeranian Philharmonic, before
musicians from the Warsaw Philharmonic
also gained international recognition. In the
his appointment as director of the Polish Radio and Television Orchestra
and Chorus in Kraków, from 1977 to 1983. From 1983 to 2000 he was
Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra • Antoni Wit

Photo: Krzysztof Niesporek

1990s the string ensemble gave concerts with managing and artistic director of the National Polish Radio Symphony
eminent soloists such as Konstanty A. Kulka Orchestra in Katowice, and from 1987 to 1992 he was the chief conductor
and Nigel Kennedy, making records and TV and then first guest conductor of the Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran
programmes. During the celebration of the Canaria. In 2002 he became managing and artistic director of the
Warsaw Philharmonic’s centenary, the Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra was reactivated under the patronage Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir. Since the season 2010/11,
of Antoni Wit. The ensemble consists of leading instrumentalists from the Warsaw Philharmonic, including former he has been first guest conductor with the Orquesta Sinfónica de Navarra
members of Karol Teutsch’s ensemble. The artistic director of the orchestra is Jan Lewtak, who graduated from the F. in Pamplona. His international career has brought engagements with
Chopin Music Academy in Warsaw after violin studies under Zenon Brzewski and Mirosław Ławrynowicz. The winner of major orchestras throughout Europe, the Americas and the Near and Far
several violin competitions and of the Radio and Television Committee Award, he has already made a significant East. He has made over 200 records, including an acclaimed release for
contribution to chamber music in Poland. Naxos of the piano concertos of Prokofiev, awarded the Diapason d’Or and Grand Prix du Disque de la Nouvelle
Académie du Disque. In January 2002 his recording of the Turangalîla Symphony by Olivier Messiaen (8.554478-79)
Violin I Violin II Viola Cello was awarded the Cannes Classical Award at MIDEM Classic 2002. In 2004 he received the Classical Internet Award.
Jan Lewtak Marian Kowalski Marek Iwański Kazimierz Koślacz He has completed for Naxos a CD series of Szymanowski’s symphonic and large-scale vocal-instrumental works, each
(Soloist on 5 6 8 @ #) Anna Bednarczyk (Soloist on 8 @) (Soloist on 6 7 8 @) rated among ‘discs of the month’ by CD magazines (Gramophone, BBC Music Magazine). He also received the Record
Marcin Mazurek Magdalena Smoczyńska Ryszard Groblewski Angelica Wais Academy Award 2005 of Japanese music magazine Record Geijutsu for Penderecki’s Polish Requiem (Naxos), and
Krystyna Wilczyńska Paweł Rybkowski (Soloist on 6) Andrzej Wiltos four Fryderyk Awards of the Polish Phonographic Academy. He has received six GRAMMY ® nominations for
Marek Powideł Marzena Dopytalska-Sójka Krzysztof Szczepański Piotr Sapilak Penderecki’s St Luke Passion in 2004 (8.557149), A Polish Requiem in 2005 (8.557386-87), Seven Gates of Jerusalem
Piotr Tadzik Grzegorz Groblewski Jacek Toczyski in 2007 (8.557766), Utrenja in 2009 (8.572031) and Karol Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater in 2008 (8.570724) and
Agnieszka Lewandowska Jan Aniołek Agnieszka Duź-Dymus Double bass Symphonies Nos. 1 and 4 in 2009 (8.570722). In 2010 Antoni Wit won the annual award of the Karol Szymanowski
Grzegorz Osiński Katarzyna Borzucka Janusz Długokęcki Foundation for his promotion of the music of Szymanowski in his Naxos recordings. Antoni Wit is professor at the
Dobrosława Siudmak-Nur Barbara Duda-Szproch Marcin Wiliński Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw.

8.572212 5 6 8.572212
Also available

8.557980 8.570450

8.572211 8.572032
 CMYK
NAXOS

NAXOS
Composed over a period of some thirty years, the six string works in this programme cover the full
stylistic range of Penderecki’s towering compositional career. The Sinfoniettas are transcriptions of two
chamber works, impassioned in texture, courting elegy and terse gesture alike. With the Three Pieces
in Old Style we are in the world of Baroque pastiche, whereas introspective intensity runs through the
Serenade of 1997. Radicalism informs the Intermezzo whilst the Capriccio, written a decade earlier, DDD
reveals Penderecki’s lighter, more piquant side in scintillating fashion. ‘Antoni Wit’s Penderecki series
PENDERECKI: Sinfoniettas • Oboe Capriccio

PENDERECKI: Sinfoniettas • Oboe Capriccio

for Naxos has been uniformly excellent… Top recommendation’. (ClassicsToday.com on 8.572032) 8.572212
Krzysztof Playing Time
PENDERECKI 58:10
(b. 1933)

7
Three Pieces in Old Style 8 Intermezzo for 24 strings

47313 22127
(1963) 6:04 (1973) 6:53
1 No. 1. Aria 2:15 9 Capriccio for Oboe
2 No. 2. Menuetto I 1:41 and String Orchestra
3 No. 3. Menuetto II 2:08 (1964)* 6:11
Serenade (1997) 9:56 Sinfonietta No. 2 (1994)† 15:02
4 I. Passacaglia 3:06 0 I. Notturno: Adagio 3:25

1
5 II. Larghetto 6:50 ! II. Scherzo: Vivacissimo 2:36

www.naxos.com
Made in the USA

Booklet notes in English

 & 훿 2012 Naxos Rights International Ltd.
Sinfonietta No. 1 (1992) 14:02 @ III. Serenade:
6 I. Allegro molto 8:54 Tempo di valse 1:51
7 II. Vivace 5:08 # IV. Abschied: Larghetto 7:10
Artur Pachlewski, Clarinet† • Jean-Louis Capezzali, Oboe*
Warsaw Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra
Antoni Wit
Recorded at Warsaw Philharmonic Hall, Warsaw, Poland, on 6th September, 2008 (tracks 1-3),
6th and 7th September, 2008 (tracks 4-5), 7th and 8th September and 3rd December, 2008 (tracks 6-7),
24th September, 2008 (track 8), 8th and 9th September, 2008 (track 9),
and 22nd and 23rd September, 2008 (tracks 10-13)
8.572212

8.572212
Produced, engineered and edited by Andrzej Sasin and Aleksandra Nagórko (CD Accord)
Publisher: Schott Music International • Booklet notes: Richard Whitehouse
Cover image by Sybille Yates (Dreamstime.com)