Adrian Thomas

Lutosławski

and his Performers

Lutosławski and his Performers

All composers recognise their debt to the performers who bring their

music to life, especially those who give the premieres. Witold Lutosławski was

no excep on. He wrote in 1980 that: 'The knowledge that the new piece

would be bap zed by a well-known ensemble or soloists, some mes even a

great ar st, was always an especially s mula ng factor for me while I was

composing it'. There is li,le evidence, however, that Lutosławski ever relied on

great ar sts in the actual composi on of his music, unlike Karol Szymanowski's

close coopera on with the violinist, Paweł Kochański. Heinz Holliger did

demonstrate some oboe mul phonics, which Lutosławski then included

somewhat awkwardly in the Double Concerto (1980). Ms slav Rostropovich

provided the fingering for the finished solo part of the Cello Concerto (1970),

but that was as far as his contribu on went.

Lutosławski first wrote for renowned performers in the mid-1960s, when he

was beginning to make his name outside Poland. Interna onal recogni on had

been held back by two circumstances beyond his control: the Second World

War and the closed cultural environment of socialist realism that prevailed in

Stalinist East-European countries un l at least the mid-50s. A;er the cultural

'thaw', symbolised in Polish music by the first 'Warsaw Autumn' fes val (1956),

Lutosławski found his free voice more speedily and securely than most.

His big break came shortly a;er his fi;ieth birthday, with the String Quartet

(1964) wri,en for the LaSalle Quartet. This was followed by Paroles ssées

(1965) for Peter Pears, whom he had met at the 'Warsaw Autumn' in 1961.

Over the coming years, Lutosławski was to write pieces for Rostropovich

(Cello Concerto and Sacher Variaon, 1975), Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau

(Les Espaces du sommeil, 1975), Janet Craxton (Epitaph, 1980), Heinz and

Ursula Holliger (Double Concerto), Pinchas Zukerman (Par ta, 1984), Anne-

Sophie Mu,er (Chain 2, 1985), Krys an Zimerman (Piano Concerto, 1988) and

Solveig Kringleborn (Chantefleurs et Chantefables, 1990). There were, of

course, soloists whose requests went unanswered, including Lothar Faber and

Ruggiero Ricci during the late 60s. Lutosławski was careful not to take on too

much - he was not a fast worker - and orchestras, too, were not always

successful in gaining his a,en on. One that was, although it had to wait some

years, was the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, which premiered the Third

Symphony (1983) under Sir Georg Sol .

Lutosławski relished working with his performers. He took up conduc ng at

the premiere of Trois poèmes d'Henri Michaux at the Zagreb Biennale in 1963.

Part of the reason for this was his concern that the performers should fully

understand his break-through nota on. This was designed to be prac cal as

well as to fit his ar s c inten ons. From Jeux véniens (1961), his clear-cut

and registrally shaped harmony was ar culated by aleatory procedures,

rhythmic cells which were subtly different for each performer at any one me.

This meant that performers and conductor could co-ordinate loosely or as one,

depending on what was required as the harmonies changed.

As a conductor, Lutosławski focused solely on his own works. His recordings

(especially with the Polish Radio Na onal Symphony Orchestra on the

EMI 6-LP set of 1978, since remastered and re-released on CD) are

benchmarks for their vitality, edge and convic on. He was a precise and

self-contained conductor, although I do remember him once bera ng the

percussionists during rehearsals for the Cello Concerto when, in the la,er

stages of the piece, he felt that they were not throwing their musical spears at

the soloist with sufficient accuracy and venom.

He was very tolerant of his soloists, giving them the leeway they needed for

their own interpreta on. As far as he was concerned, they had just as much

right to the music as he had. Very occasionally this created problems, and he

preferred some interpreters to others. He hugely admired Rostropovich, but

came to favour less demonstra ve performances of the Cello Concerto. He

apparently commented, a;er the premiere, that the Russian had "made the

piece his own". That could be read two ways. Certainly, Lutosławski became

uncomfortable with Rostropovich's view that this work, and his role in it,

mirrored his life under oppressive Soviet authori es. And yet, in the concerto's

sketches and in private comments to Rostropovich and other interpreters of

the work, including Heinrich Schiff and Roman Jabłoński, Lutosławski also

wrote and talked in programma c terms.

Lutosławski's declared aim was always to provide a purely musical drama,

whatever impulses lay hidden behind the composi on. This Classical rather

than Roman c outlook was what drove him crea vely, even in his songs. Yet

his own performances, and those by others, o;en brought new expressive

depth to the music, and Lutosławski was composer enough to recognise that

this was both inevitable and enriching.

Adrian Thomas