Panie muzykancie prosim zagrać walca Kodály: Norvég leányok • Norwegian Maidens Hrušovsky: Tri etúdy (Három etűd • Three Etudes)

Pad Zoltán

Pad Zoltán Liszt-díjas karnagy a budapesti Zeneakadémián és Münchenben végezte tanulmányait. 2009 és 2014 között a debreceni Kodály Kórus vezető karnagyaként dolgozott, 2014-től a Magyar Rádió Énekkarának vezető karnagya. Nemzetközileg magasan jegyzett dirigens, aki az elmúlt években olyan együtteseket vezényelt, mint a stuttgarti SWR Vocalensemble, a lipcsei MDR Rádiókórus, a Francia Rádiókórus, a ChorWerk Ruhr, a Lengyel Rádiókórus, az Arsys Bourgogne Kamarakórus, a Horvát Rádiókórus és a World Youth Choir, valamint olyan kiváló karmesterekkel és együttesekkel dolgozhatott együtt, mint Sir Simon Rattle és a Berlini Filharmonikusok, Daniel Harding, Eötvös Péter és a Bécsi Filharmonikus Zenekar, Zubin Mehta és az Izraeli Filharmonikus Zenekar, Alan Gilbert, Helmuth Rilling, Christoph Gedschold, Kazuki Yamada, Pier Giorgio Morandi, Kocsis Zoltán, Vashegyi György, Kesselyák Gergely, Fischer Iván, Fischer Ádám vagy Howard Arman. Széles repertoárja a reneszánsz zenétől a legújabb darabokig terjed, számos ősbemutató fűződik nevéhez. A magyar kortárs zene, valamint Bartók, Kodály és Ligeti műveinek elkötelezett tolmácsolója. Elhivatott pedagógus, világszerte tart workshopokat, karvezetéskurzusokat.

Ferenc Liszt: Petrarch’s Sonnets (Years of Pilgrimage – 2nd year, Italy)

Liszt first read Petrarch in the late 1830s, when he travelled in Italy with Comtesse Marie d’Agoult. Petrarch became one of those great old Italian artists who gave inspiration to Liszt. The three sonnets were included in the second series – the Italian volume – of the Years of Pilgrimage (Années de pèlerinage), in what is now their best-known form, as piano pieces. However, they were first set to music by Liszt as songs, arranged in 1838–39 for tenor voice with piano accompaniment. Almost at the same time as he wrote the songs, he also produced solo piano versions. This “songs without words” were then revised for the Italian volume, to which they were added in the early 1850s. Liszt would later return to Petrarch’s sonnets, arranging the original tenor songs for other voices. “For Liszt, Petrarch is an Italian poet who had to be set to music ‘in Italian,’” wrote Klára Hamburger. “Now,

Karol Szymanowski: Sześć pieśni kurpiowskich (Six Kurpie Songs)

Szymanowski (1882–1937) discovered for himself the folk art and music of the Kurpie region, one of the most colourful areas of Polish folklore, in the late 1920s. The Six Kurpie Songs were the first fruit of his newly risen interest. His source was a 1928 publication, Władysław Skierkowski’s Puszcza kurpiowska w pieśni, a collection of wedding feast songs from the area around the village of Myszyniec. Szymanowski was fascinated by these raw and archaic melodies, and wrote two pieces, the first two of the subsequent cycle. They were such a success at an academy concert that he went on to compose four more. The six choral movements were completed in early 1929 and appeared in print the same year. Szymanowski combines the modal melodies of the folk songs with elements of his own style: bold, dissonant harmonies, varied and alternating rhythms.

Zoltán Kodály: Norwegian Maidens

Based on a poem by Sándor Weöres, this choral piece was composed in 1940, in the wake of the German occupation of Norway. Weöres recalled the birth of the poem and the choral piece thus: “During a trip to Norway, I often saw girls walking in the almost constantly drizzling mist, in red, green, yellow, blue, raincoats of all colours. This experience is the basis of the poem, Norwegian Girls, which I sent to Master Kodály shortly after completion, as something I thought was worth setting to music. But he didn’t like it at first. He put it aside, he didn’t feel like working with it. Then later he chanced upon it in his drawer, and now saw it in a completely different light. Kodály showed a deft hand dealing with the poem, and nicely corrected what was jarring, unpleasant in it. I even adopted his corrections, and though a poem and its sung version need not be identical, Kodály’s corrections were definitely better, and it is in this emended version that the poem now exists.”

Ivan Hrušovsky: Tri etúdy (Three Etudes)

Ivan Hrušovský (1927–2001), the Bratislava-born Slovak composer was an important educator as well. The choral etudes he composed in 1974 do not form a closed cycle, and the third piece, which is the most popular, is usually performed on its own.

Márton Levente Horváth: O vos omnes

This short, mostly homophonic composition was written in 2008, and was premiered by an ad hoc choir formed by students of the Liszt Academy. It has since become part of the repertoire of numerous groups. The harmonic vocabulary and distinctive linking of chords may remind listeners of certain late Renaissance madrigals. The Latin text has been part of the Good Friday lamentation for many centuries, quoting the laments of Jeremiah: “Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by? Look around and see. Is any suffering like my suffering?”

Krzysztof Penderecki: O gloriosa Virginum

In 2009, Penderecki (1933–2020) went to Venezuela to work with a youth orchestra, the Orquesta Sinfónica de la Juventud Venezolana Simón Bolívar. Founded by José Antonio Abreu, the orchestra is a gem of the country’s music education programme, El Sistema, which has become world-famous. Penderecki wrote this choral piece for the 70th birthday of Abreu.

Henryk Górecki: Totus tuus

Górecki (1933–2010) composed this work in 1987, when Pope John Paul II visited Poland. It is considered by many to be one of the most important pieces of a cappella music written in the 1980s. The lyrics are based on the poem of Polish poet Maria Bogusławska, and addresses the Virgin Mary, Poland’s patron saint.

Ferenc Liszt: Ave verum; Salve Regina

Liszt first took an interest in choral church music in the 1860s, and it became more and more important for him. He was convinced that liturgical music could not be revitalized without a return to the roots: the new music was to expect impulses from the revival of the monophonic Gregorian tradition and Palestrina’s polyphony. This was the concept that informed Ave verum corpus (1871), in which Liszt imbued the music’s texture with an almost bewilderingly bold chromaticism. The 1885 Salve Regina is Liszt’s last religious work, a veritable gem that is airy and translucent, and the sensuous shimmering of the harmonies throws a peculiar light on the text of the medieval hymn.

Petr Eben: Cantico delle creature

St Francis of Assisi’s Canticle of the Sun has enticed composers to create ever new settings for centuries. The music of the Czech Petr Eben (1929–2007) is characterized by radiant lightness, splendid timbres and dynamic richness, while demanding superior technical skills from its performers. “Through its form (Introduction-A-B-C-A-B-D-Coda), the piece reflects the differing characters of the various elements addressed in the song: a vigorous song of praise to the sun, the tranquillity of the moon and the stars, the lament of the wind, the flames of fire, the heaviness of the earth and the drama of death.” The work was commissioned by the European Choir Festival in Neerpelt, Belgium, where it was a compulsory piece for the competition.

Levente Gyöngyösi: O Maria, noli flere (Oh, Mary, Come, Don’t Cry – Philippe de Grève’s song to Mary Magdalene)

There are two versions of the musical setting of a hymn by medieval poet Philippe de Grève. Gyöngyösi wrote the first on commission from Dénes Szabó, for a female choir, and it was premiered by the Pro Musica Girls’ Choir in 2014, in Japan. The second version, for mixed choir, was written in 2015. Lyrical and swelling with emotion, the music faithfully conveys the mood and message of the poem: “Why would you cry and sob? Why doesn’t your sorrow lift? The one you love goes with you. / Why turn his gravestone? / It was Jesus you wanted: / you’ve found him – and you don’t know.”

Cracow Singers

Founded in 2013, the Cracow Singers is a chamber choir composed of experienced professional singers, which immediately caused a stir in the world of performing art with novel projects that are centred around the relationship between the different forms of art and fields of knowledge. The ensemble is a leading group of Krakow’s artistic life, and is a welcome guest at European festivals and diverse international collaborations. Old and contemporary music are present with equal weight in their a cappella repertoire, and they often appear in concert with instrumentalists and orchestras, partners who are as likely to be classical musicians as jazz performers. They first came to Hungary for the Hungarian premiere of Lera Auerbach’s 72 Angels. In 2018, the chamber choir took part in a large-scale artistic project and performed Lamentationes, the work of the 16th-century Polish composer, Wacław of Szamotuły, which has not been sung since the Renaissance. The composer’s longest piece was reconstructed from original sources, and was recorded by the Cracow Singers. The artistic director of Cracow Singers is singer and choirmaster Karol Kusz, who also teaches, and in 2018 established an institution called the Cracow Singers Vocal Institute.

ZOLTÁN PAD

Photo: Zsófi a Raff ay

Zoltán Pad

Liszt Prize winning choirmaster Zoltán Pad studied at Budapest’s Liszt Academy and in Munich. He was principal choirmaster of the Debrecen Kodály Choir between 2009–2014, and has filled the same position at the Hungarian Radio Choir since 2014. He is an internationally acclaimed conductor who in recent years has conducted such outstanding groups as the SWR Vocalensemble in Stuttgart, the MDR Radio Choir in Leipzig, the French Radio Choir, the ChorWerk Ruhr, the Polish Radio Choir, the Arsys Bourgogne Chamber Choir, the Croatian Chamber Choir and the World Youth Choir, and has worked with distinguished conductors and ensembles such as Sir Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic, Daniel Harding, Péter Eötvös and the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Zubin Mehta and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Alan Gilbert, Helmuth Rilling, Christoph Gedschold, Pier Giorgio Morandi, Zoltán Kocsis, György Vashegyi, Gergely Kesselyák, Iván Fischer, Ádám Fischer and Howard Arman. His extensive repertoire ranges from Renaissance music to the latest pieces, with numerous world premieres to his name. He is a committed interpreter of Hungarian contemporary music, as well as of the works of Bartók, Kodály and Ligeti. A dedicated teacher, he holds workshops and choir conducting courses worldwide.

Fotó: Karol Kusz

lisztunnep.hu

Címlapfotó: Bartek Barczyk