Wildly Joyous Lutoslawski and Brahms orchestral music - grips GERALD FENECH 'Peruvian conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya marshalls his Fort Worth forces with effortless control.'

After World War II, Poland soon found itself under a new regime: Stalin's Soviet Russia, and just as Russian artists were subjected to severe censorship and regimentation, so were their Polish counterparts. It was in this almost unbearable political climate that Witold Lutosławski (1913-1994) was 'ordered' to compose works based upon Polish folk songs, and the ideal opportunity soon arrived. In 1950, the famous conductor Witold Rowicki had just founded the Warsaw Philharmonic, and he duly asked the composer to write a new piece, something not too difficult, but audacious enough for the new ensemble to display its qualities.

This was the chance Lutosławski had been waiting for...

JOHANNES BRAHMS

ARNOLD SCHOENBERG

HARMONIA MUNDI

ORCHESTRAL MUSIC

POLAND

GERMANY

TEXAS

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA