On 23 January 2020 at 7.00 p.m. soprano Milena Lange and the Warsaw Impressione Orchestra under the direction Piotr Wijatkowski will perform Karol Szymanowski's 12 Kurpie Songs, Op. 58. The concert was recorded in the Church of the Savior of the World in Ostrołęka, the capital of Kurpie.
Kurpie Songs, Op. 58 were originally written for voice and piano. Numerous transcriptions are a solid testimony of the popularity and artistic rank of the work. During the upcoming concert Milena Lange will perform the entire series in a rarely presented arrangement for soprano and symphony orchestra.
Karol Szymanowski composed Kurpie Songs in the years 1930-1932. In his last vocal cycle, the composer reached out for Rev. Władysław Skierkowski's collection Puszcza kurpiowska w pieśni. The well-known musicologist Tadeusz A. Zieliński aptly summed up the great artistic value of the composition: "One of the most valuable and original of all Szymanowski's works, the Kurpie Songs are a worthy culmination of his rich and evolving song production. A masterful combination of genuine folk with profundity and expressiveness of 'high' art, they are an unsurpassed phenomenon; a similar work is not easy to find in the 20th century music".
The concert will be broadcast on the website: https://www.mspromotion.net/karolszymanowskipiesnikurpiowskie and on the YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/mspromotion7