Koczalski PCs 1 & 2

[Rob H]

I have just noticed this on Acte Prealable website. I didn't even know he had written them...

"The world premiere recording of the First and Second Piano Concertos by Raul Koczalski took place on July 13th and 14th in Rzeszów. These works have been recently discovered by Jan A. Jarnicki. The world premiere of the First Concerto took place last year in Słupsk (performed by the Koszalin Philharmonic Orchestra), during the closing concert of the Polish Pianism Festival, the Second Concerto was first performed on June 17th 2017 in Radziejowice (by Sinfonia Varsovia). Both performances were done by phenomenal artists: the superb Polish pianist Joanna Lawrynowicz and the outstanding Italian conductor Massimiliano Caldi. The same artists, together with the Filharmonia Podkarpacka, realized the first recording in history of the above mentioned pieces. The recording will be available on CD later this year."

Rob

[eschiss1]

Interesting, IMSLP has a work of his but he'd passed me by I think. An opera of his is @ Hathitrust in vocal score (and a few other operas were also published by Pabst in the early years of the 20th century) , the piano concerto Op.83 was published in 1936 by Tischer & Jagenberg (Ewald Straesser's main publisher, by the way)...

[Alan Howe]

More about the composer here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raoul_Koczalski

[Alan Howe]

You can hear the (very lovely) end of the slow movement of PC1 here (first item):
http://www.acteprealable.com/

[eschiss1]

According to German Wikipedia, he composed 6 piano concertos. Hopefully they all still exist and this is the first volume of three. (Also concertos for violin and for cello.)

(Concertos Op.79 in B minor, Op.83 in G (1914), Op.125 in C, Op.130 in B-flat, Op.140 in D minor (1942), Op.145 in E (1944). Violin concerto in A Op.84, cello concerto in B minor Op.85 (1915). Also 10 piano sonatas, 4 violin sonatas, etc.)

[Gerhard Griesel]

The sample piece is incredibly beautiful. Please keep us updated when this CD becomes available.

[chill319]

Could someone please provide a link to the excerpt. I can't find a link on the Acte prealable site.

[Mark Thomas]

The music plays as soon as the (home) page has finished loading.

[Alan Howe]

The CD is now described as 'coming soon'.



http://www.acteprealable.com/coming_soon.html

[semloh]

Thanks for drawing attention to this. It's a new name to me, and a perfect example of an unjustly Unsung Composer.
The CD goes straight to the wants list!

[Rob H]

Looking again at the front cover I notice it includes the first two concertos but says "Piano Concertos 1". I take this to be volume 1 so I think we can assume the other concertos are to be recorded. Here's hoping.
Rob

[Alan Howe]

Well spotted! An intriguing prospect.

[eschiss1]

have there been any recordings of his music (post-1920 say) otherwise? I see recordings of him with Celibidache in Chopin's F minor concerto and some solo recordings (the complete Koczalski piano recordings, mostly Chopin iirc??) but that's it. Maybe one of his piano sonatas, actually (sonatina, in C) now I think on it?
Looking forward to hearing the concertos. And hoping of course that I'll then wish his other music were recorded too

[Rob H]

Ingolf Wunder plays his Valse fantaisie op49 on the album "300".
Koczalski plays his own Praeludium, Impression op75 and Renata waltz on Marston 52063 and his Impromptu op124 on Archiphon ARC-119/20.
Selene records have his Scherzo op131 on Koczalski vol7, several piano pieces on vol2 (preludes, sonatina, Polish suite etc), vol3 (waltz, nocturne, suite etc), vol4 has songs and vol1 has mazurkas, etude and waltz.
Acte Prealable has also recorded vol1 of his chamber works (AP0383).

[hyperdanny]

the sound bite sounds indeed beautiful...Massimiliano Caldi is a fine young (-ish) conductor, here in Milan he's appeared several times with the Pomeriggi Musicali Orchestra and the Giuseppe Verdi SO