The Organ Music Days will be held for he fifty-third time on 11 and 12 December 2020. Due to the pandemic situation, this year's edition will be held only on the Kraków Philharmonic's YouTube channel.
The first Organ Music Days were held in 1966 on the initiative of prof. Eugenia Umińska – the then rector of the State Higher School of Music, and Henryk Czyż – artistic director of the Kraków Philharmonic. This festival was created to commemorate the merits of prof. Bronisław Rutkowski – artist, teacher and long-time rector of the State Higher School of Music in Kraków, who started the renaissance of organ art in Poland. The form of the Organ Music Days has changed over the course of this half century. Recitals, chamber, symphonic and oratorio concerts have been organized as part of the festival, presenting the rich repertoire from the Renaissance to contemporary music. Organ literature has so far been performed by such outstanding virtuosos as Marie-Claire Alan, Jennifer Bate, Guy Bovet, Josef Bucher, Olivier Latry, Simon Preston, Lionel Rogg, Daniel Roth, Almut Rössler, David Titterington and Gillian Weir.
The 53rd Organ Music Days will be inaugurated on 11 December at 7.30 p.m. by the Kraków Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir conducted by Massimiliano Caldi and organist Tomasz Głuchowski. We will hear Georg Friedrich Haendel's Organ concerto in D minor HWV 309, Gregorio Allegri's Organ concerto in F major and Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony No. 1 in C major, Op. 21. On the second evening, the Kraków Philharmonic Choir will perform works by Paweł Łukaszewski, Arvo Pärt, James MacMillan and Felix Mendelssohn. The programme will also include Johann Sebastian Bach's Prelude and Fugue in E flat major BWV 552 and chorales BWV 659 and 662 as well as Luis Vierne's Clair de lune and Carillon de Westminster from the cycle 24 Pièces de Fantaisie pour orgue, Op. 53 performed by Arkadiusz Bialic.
Full programme is available at: http://www.filharmonia.krakow.pl/