Edward Elgar’s fascinating Enigma Variations, Op. 36, consolidated the British composer's reputation. Completed in 1899, the work consists of a theme and fourteen variations, each of which is a musical portrait of one of the composer’s friends. The "enigma" of the title refers to a hidden melody within the theme, which Elgar never explicitly revealed, prompting countless speculations that continue to this day. The work’s rich orchestration and the distinctive character of its individual variations – not least the noble, hymn-like Nimrod, No. 9 – make it one of the most remarkable examples of symphonic imagination from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
A different kind of “enigma” – a work we have yet to hear and one that naturally arouses curiosity – will be the world première of a new composition by Paweł Malinowski, commissioned by the Warsaw Philharmonic. Born in 1994, the composer has had his works performed at festivals including the Warsaw Autumn, Sacrum Profanum and Musica Electronica Nova. In 2016, he was awarded first prize in the Tadeusz Baird Competition for Young Composers. Paweł Malinowski’s music is often an intellectual play with memory and pre-existing sound objects, in which he reworks elements of popular culture and music of the past into a new, multilayered narrative, doing so with detachment and often with irony.
Dmitri Shostakovich wrote his Piano Concerto No. 2 in F major as a gift for his son Maxim, a pianist. Unlike many of the Russian master’s works, imbued with a sense of tragedy and heroism, this concerto is distinguished by its cheerful character. The three-movement work combines brilliant virtuosity with a transparent formal design, while its central movement – filled with nostalgic lyricism that seems to conceal yet another mystery: an undisclosed programme behind the music – is among the finest pages in the composer’s output.
Piotr Maculewicz
