Translate
The music of Ukrainian composer Valentin Silvestrov has become increasingly well represented in recording catalogues, to which Naxos has been delighted to contribute several albums of his orchestral works. We add to that now with a programme of two pieces that are heard in their world premiere commercial recordings. By turns intimate, eloquent and heartfelt, the Violin Concerto and the Eighth Symphony receive deeply sympathetic interpretations.
Valentin SILVESTROV (b. 1937)
Symphony No. 8
Violin Concerto *
Janusz Wawrowski, Violin *Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra
Christopher Lyndon-Gee
Valentin Silvestrov was forced to leave his native Ukraine after the Russian invasion of 2022. His music has a prescient quality that unerringly seems to express the fate of his homeland. The intimate Violin Concerto and the heartfelt, single-span Eighth Symphony are notable for their economy of expression and emphasis on beauty, depth and harmony. This is music that hovers on the edge of silence in an uplifting homage to love and humanity, hope and renewal.
I. Elegie
Violinist Janusz Wawrowski has appeared at a number of the world’s leading concert halls, including the Musikverein Wien, London's Wigmore Hall and the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg. He has premiered numerous violin concertos, and is the dedicatee of works by Tomasz J. Opałka, Marcin Markowicz and Norbert Palej, among others. An important part of his career is the interpretation and research of Polish music, and among his many accolades he was awarded the Polish Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis. He plays a 1685 Stradivarius ‘Polonia’ violin.
Conductor/composer Christopher Lyndon-Gee is known for his extensive catalogue of recordings, almost all of these since 1994 with Naxos. They include the complete orchestral works of Igor Markevitch and Edgard Varèse; most of the symphonies and orchestral works of George Rochberg (a project still in progress); and, since their first collaborations in Kyiv in 2016, the present series of works by Valentin Silvestrov. Other prize-winning recordings include the music of Hans Werner Henze, Respighi, Shostakovich, Larry Sitsky (the opera The Golem), Stravinsky, Bliss and Richard Strauss.
The Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra presents around 50 concerts annually in the Lithuanian National Philharmonic Hall and across Lithuania. It has also performed in some of the most prestigious international concert venues, such as the Musikverein Wien, the philharmonic halls of Cologne and Berlin, and the Barbican Centre in London. Its varied repertoire comprises oratorios and symphonies from various periods, as well as contemporary music, with an emphasis on well-known works by Lithuanian composers and the first symphonies of many young composers.
Moments of Memory II
Serenade • The Messenger – 1996
Farewell Serenade • Silent Music
Starodub
Kiev Virtuosi
Yablonsky
– Fanfare
Symphony No. 7
Ode to a Nightingale • Piano Concertino
Galatenko • Bezborodko
Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra
Lyndon-Gee
– Gramophone
Symphony for Violin and Orchestra ‘Widmung’
Postludium for Piano and Orchestra
Wawrowski • Karnavičius
Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra
Lyndon-Gee
– BBC Music Magazine
LYATOSHINSKY • POLEVA • SILVESTROV
Pivnenko • Yaropud • Suprun • Pogoretskyi
Starodub
– BBC Music Magazine ★★★★