Composers / Witold Lutosławski / Places catalog

Amsterdam

The first foreign premiere of a work by Lutosławski came at the radio studio in Amsterdam, during a programme devoted to contemporary Polish music. The concert, given on 6 May 1947 and broadcast live by Dutch Radio, included two piano etudes written during the war and published in Cracow in 1946. Unfortunately, it has not yet been established who performed them.

Lutosławski first visited Amsterdam in 1948, for the World Music Days organised by the International Society for Contemporary Music. His First Symphony, put forward by the ISCM’s Polish section, was not selected for the programme by the international jury, and so he travelled to the Netherlands just to listen. He had another chance to visit Amsterdam in 1963, also for the World Music Days, but five years later a third trip was thwarted by politics. At the beginning of September 1968, Lutosławski was about to travel there to sit on the jury of a composition competition organised by the Gaudeamus foundation and for a performance of one of his works (presumably the Second Symphony). At the last minute, however, his invitation was withdrawn, because the Dutch government demanded a boycott of citizens of those countries which – like Poland – had attacked Czechoslovakia in August that year.

Despite that episode, the openness to new music in the Netherlands meant that Lutosławski travelled to that country many more times. He was most often invited to Amsterdam and Rotterdam, but he also visited other places. In 1983, together with Het Brabants Orkest, he appeared in five cities in the north of the country, inaugurating a new concert series: ‘Portrait of a Composer’. Then when the organisers of the Holland Festival learned of the composing of the Piano Concerto, they wanted to acquire the rights to its first performance, but that was ultimately given in Salzburg.


Concertgebouw

Witold Lutosławski enjoyed excellent contacts with the Concertgebouw Orchestra, initiated in January 1960 by Bernard Haitink with a performance of the Concerto for Orchestra. On 11 May 1969, Lutosławski appeared with that ensemble in person, conducting Musique funèbre and Trois poèmes d’Henri Michaux; the recordings made then are now available in the seriesAnthology of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. During Lutosławski’s lifetime, the Concertgebouw performed as many as eleven of his works, and he appeared with the orchestra on six occasions. After the first presentation of Mi-parti – a work composed to the orchestra’s commission – the reviewer of Het Parool wrote: ‘I cannot remember any contemporary composer being so enthusiastically received at theConcertgebouw’.

Place Category
Aix-en-Provence Appearances
Aldeburgh Appearances
Amsterdam Appearances
Århus Education
Aspen Appearances
Austin Other
Baranów Sandomierski Other
Basel Other
Basztowa Street Performance spaces
Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts Other
BBC Orchestra and other ensembles Appearances
Belfast Other
Berea Performance spaces
Berlin Appearances
Białystok Education
Boston Appearances
Brisbane Other
Budapest Other
Calgary Education, Other
Cambridge Other
Celle Publishers / Bookshops
Chicago Appearances
Cincinnati Other
Cleveland Appearances
Cologne Other
Copenhagen Appearances
Cracow Philharmonic Performance spaces
Dartington Education
Donaueschingen Other
Dresden Other
Drozdowo Flats
Düsseldorf Appearances
Edinburgh Other
Evian Appearances
Filmography Radio / TV
Florence Appearances
Geneva Appearances
Glasgow Other
Graz Other
Guildhall School of Music and Drama
Hagen Other, Performance spaces
Hamburg Other
Hanover (New Hampshire) Other
Helsinki Education
Herkulessaal Appearances, Performance spaces
Houston Other
Huddersfield Appearances
Indianapolis Other
Jagiellonian University Education
Katowice Other
Kazimierz nad Wisłą Other
Komorów Flats
Łagów Other
Lancaster Appearances
La Rochelle Appearances
Leeds Appearances
Leipzig Education, Performance spaces, Publishers / Bookshops
Lisbon Appearances
Liverpool Appearances
Łomża Education
London Sinfonietta Performance spaces
Los Angeles Appearances
Louisville (Kentucky) Other
Lublin Appearances
Lucerne Other
Madrid Appearances
Manchester Appearances
Mikołajki Other
Milan Appearances
Montreal Appearances
Moscow Appearances
Munich Philharmonic Appearances, Performance spaces
New York Appearances
Odense Education, Performance spaces
Olsztyn Education
Opio (near Grasse) Flats
Oslo Other
Paris Appearances
Pittsburgh Appearances
Poznań Other
Prague Appearances
PWM EDITION Publishers / Bookshops
Riga Performance spaces
Rome Other
Rotterdam Appearances
Royal Albert Hall Appearances, Performance spaces
Royal Philharmonic Society Appearances
Saint Paul (Minnesota) Other
Salzburg Other
San Francisco Appearances
Strasbourg Appearances
Stawisko
Stockholm Appearances
Sydney Appearances
Szczecin Other
Tanglewood Education, Other
Tokyo Appearances
Toronto Education
Toruń Education
Venice Performance spaces
Vienna Performance spaces
Villars-sur-Ollon Other
Warsaw Appearances, Flats, Other, Performance spaces
Washington Appearances
Wawel Appearances
Wehr near Rheinfelden Other
Wrocław Other, Performance spaces
Wzdów Other
Zagreb Performance spaces
Zegrze Other
Zurich Performance spaces