Maria Szymanowska - Ballades & Romances (Elisabeth Zapolska; Bart van Oort)

Information

Composer: Maria Szymanowska

1. Le Départ (M. de Cervantes' Don Quichotte de la Manche "trad. Florian JPC)
2. Complainte d'un aveugle demandait qui l'aumône au Jardin du Roi à Paris
3. Josephine Romance
4. 6 Romances: 1. Comb et Plaisir (Sergei Pushkin)
5. 6 Romances: Romance du Saule Chantee 2. Desdemone couple dans Othello (Shakespeare)
6. 6 Romances: 3. Ballade (Madame de Saint-Onge)
7. 6 Romances: 4. Romance à la nuit (Anonymous)
8. 6 Romances: 5. Le connais-tu? (Cardinal de Bernis)
9. 6 Romances: 6. potessi is spiegar (Anonymous)
10. Romance du Prince Galitzine arrangé pour Pianoforte solo
11. Śpiewy historyczne (Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz): 1. Kazimirerz Wielki
12. Śpiewy historyczne (Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz): 2. Jadwiga, Królowa Polska
13. Śpiewy historyczne (Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz): 3. Jan Albrycht
14. Śpiewy historyczne (Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz): 4. Duma or kniaziu Glińskim
15. Śpiewy historyczne (Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz): 5. Stefan Czarniecki
16. Willija (Adam Mickiewicz "Konrad Wallenrod")
17. Z Pieśń wieży (Adam Mickiewicz "Konrad Wallenrod")
18. Ballada Alpuhara (Adam Mickiewicz "Konrad Wallenrod")
19. Świtezianka (Adam Mickiewicz)
20. Na dwa Śpiewka glosy (Czeczot / Mickiewicz)

Elisabeth Zapolska, mezzo-soprano
Bart van Oort, piano

Date: 2012
Label: Acte Préalable
http://acteprealable.com/albums/ap0260.html

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Review

MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL'S RECORDING OF THE MONTH

Maria Szymanowska was justly famous during her short lifetime and was thought highly of by some of the most well known and influential people of the day such as Goethe. He described her as this “ravishing Almighty of the sound world”. The composer Cherubini dedicated his Fantasy in C to her. Admirers included Beethoven, Paganini, Clementi and Pushkin, yet her name is scarcely known today. Born in Warsaw the same year as the French Revolution to a Jewish family that had converted to Catholicism, Marianna Wolowska was exceptionally talented and astonished audiences by improvising at the spinet at an early age. Sent to Paris at the age of 21 she garnered admiration from all quarters and by 1815 she began touring, firstly within Poland and then throughout Europe from St Petersburg to London and from Vienna to Dresden and Berlin. Not only did she achieve success as a virtuoso pianist but also as a composer, mainly of songs. The present disc is a great introduction to them.

The mezzo-soprano Elizabeth Zapolska has made it her project to champion this wonderfully gifted composer and has made a careful selection of songs to demonstrate the breadth of her creativity. The first half of the disc comprising 21 tracks is devoted to songs in French while the rest are in Polish. The latter include five commemorating Polish historical figures. These were commissioned by Julian Niemcewicz the Polish poet, playwright and statesman. They are all beautifully written songs marvellously sung by Elizabeth Zapolska whose diction in French is impeccable and in Polish, perfect as one would expect. Her voice has a bell-like clarity. She is accompanied by the extremely talented pianist Bart van Oort on a wonderful sounding Broadwood piano (the English make preferred by Szymanowska) of 1825 from the collection of Joop Klinkhamer, Amsterdam. The booklet notes by Elizabeth Zapolska are thorough in their examination of the talented Szymanowska. They point out that the composer’s writing for the piano “reflects a pianist in search of a new language, which allows her to widen the palette of sound colors and musical themes ...”

This is a disc of rare quality that enables us to get to know the undoubted talents of a composer who happened to be a woman who, though well known and well respected during her lifetime, has since faded from view. It is to be hoped that this disc will help in rescuing her from oblivion and allow her to take her rightful place as a considerable writer for piano and voice.

-- Steve Arloff, MusicWeb International

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Maria Szymanowska (December 14, 1789 – July 25, 1831, St. Petersburg, Russia) was a Polish composer and one of the first professional virtuoso pianists of the 19th century. She toured extensively throughout Europe, especially in the 1820s, before settling permanently in St. Petersburg. In the Russian imperial capital, she composed for the court, gave concerts, taught music, and ran an influential salon. Her compositions—largely piano pieces, songs, and other small chamber works, as well as the first piano concert etudes and nocturnes in Poland—typify the stile brillant of the era preceding Chopin.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Szymanowska

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Elisabeth Zapolska is Polish opera singer (mezzo-soprano) and philologist who was born in Warsaw and based in France since 1988. She studied at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music and completed her training by taking part in courses and master classes in France and Austria. Zapolska gives recitals throughout Europe, records rare repertories for Polish Radio and Television, for France 2 and Radio France, and participates in the recording of numerous CDs. She is the President of the Maria Szymanowska Society in Paris, and is the author of the project Maria Szymanowska (1789-1831), a Woman of Europe.
https://mgecoge.org/musicien?id=114
http://www.maria-szymanowska.eu/elisabeth-zapolska-en

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