Violin Visionaries with Kinga Augustyn
A bountiful resource that we’re privileged to share here at The Sembrich is the gift of music--- showcasing performances by extraordinary talents in The Sembrich Studio, year after year. Though our studio has remained uncharacteristically quiet this summer, the music continues, through the wonder of technology and the generous contributions of outstanding performers who have agreed to join us virtually this season, including this online concert that we’re presenting today featuring violin virtuosa Kinga Augustyn (Kinga’s full biography is listed at the conclusion of this post).
Kinga is a member of what we affectionately dub “our extended Sembrich family of musicians” (artists who have made appearances at The Sembrich in the past). She made her studio debut on July 30, 2016 in a program of Polish masterworks, including music by Chopin, Wieniawski, Paderewski, Penderecki and Gorecki. Though Kinga’s remarkable career has taken her across the globe, performing concerti with orchestras and recitals with piano, she also frequently presents unaccompanied solo violin recitals, a medium ideal for today’s online program entitled Violin Visionaries.
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 - 1750) Click to enlarge
“Violin” and “visionary” are two words that pair well together. The violin, with its soulful sound and expressive possibilities, close in timbre to the tone of the human voice, is also among the most versatile of instruments, equipped with a four octave range and boundless technical capabilities. So it’s no wonder that the most innovative and visionary of composers over time have been drawn to the violin as a means of expression. In fact, most of the composers featured on today’s program were themselves accomplished violinists as well.
To begin, we turn to the composer widely regarded as “the father of classical music” who defined what we today regard as “the rudiments of music,” Johann Sebastian Bach. The genius of Bach is succinctly stated by outstanding Bach conductor, Helmuth Rilling (from an article in Gramophone magazine):
“(Bach) was the great consolidator, summing up the best of what had gone before, refining the best ideas of his own time…He’s the teacher par excellence. His music has influenced every later generation of composers and musicians – a heritage that continues right up to our own time. My friend Krzysztof Penderecki told me that without Bach he would never have written his own St. Luke Passion.”
Prior to the Baroque era, stringed instruments were used primarily as chordal accompaniment for vocal works. By the early seventeenth century, after gradual advancements and improvements over time, the violin emerged as the instrument we know today, what Grove’s dictionary defines as an “expressive and virtuoso solo instrument.” J.S. Bach was among the first composers to explore fully the immense possibilities of the violin in this new capacity.
Krzysztof Penderecki with Sembrich Artistic Director Richard Wargo in Lviv, Ukraine, 2015. Without Bach, Penderecki "would never have written his own St. Luke Passion."
Although they never met, master violin-maker Antonio Stradivari (1644 – 1737) (pictured) and J. S. Bach (1685 – 1750) reached the pinnacles of their professions at almost exactly the same moment in history.
Our Violin Visionaries concert begins with Kinga Augustyn performing Gavotte en Rondeau from Partita No. 3 by Johann Sebastian Bach:
Paganini, Deal with the Devil by A. Ashley, circa 1842. Click to enlarge
Niccolò Paganini (1782 – 1840) was one of the most celebrated violinists of all time. His virtuosity and technique, in fact, were so astounding that rumors persisted throughout his life that, in order to achieve such musical brilliance, Paganini had sold his soul to the devil.
“One of the first rumors came out of a concert in Vienna, where one audience member said they thought they had seen the devil helping Paganini play,” this according to an article posted by classicfm.com. “People soon began claiming to have doppelgängers of Paganini with horns and hooves. It was even said that the Devil once made lightning strike the end of Paganini’s bow during a performance.”
Rumors of Paganini’s pact with the Devil were compounded when the composer, on his deathbed, refused to receive last rites from a priest.
The article on classicfm.com continues: “After his local church refused to bury him, his body was later taken to an abandoned leper house, before being moved to a cement vat in an olive oil factory and later to a private house near Nice.
Niccolò Paganini (1819) by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres. Click to enlarge
Almost four years after his death, Pope Gregory XVI allowed the violinist’s body to be transported to Genoa, and he was finally laid to rest in La Villetta Cemetery in Parma, Italy – some 200 km from his birthplace in Genoa.”
The sensational aspects of Paganini’s life and death overshadowed the musician’s own significant innovations as both performer and composer.
“Known particularly for his fiendish 24 Caprices for Solo Violin, Paganini helped popularize certain string techniques such as bow bounces – spiccato – as well as left-hand pizzicato and harmonics. He also purposely mistuned strings to make certain pieces easier to play.” (classicfm.com)
Kinga is no stranger to this virtuosic repertoire having released her own CD recording of 24 Caprices on RovenRecords in 2016. Here now is Kinga Augustyn performing Caprice No. 14 in E-Flat Major by Niccolò Paganini:
Nadia Boulanger, image courtesy of Classical Music Indy
Copland and Boulanger (1945). Click to enlarge
The next two composers on today’s program, Grażyna Bacewicz and Astor Piazzolla, were greatly influenced by Nadia Boulanger, a musical personality that looms large across our entire Virtual Visionaries series. Born in 1887 in Paris, France, Boulanger was one of the most influential teachers of her time, inspiring generations of composers. American composer Ned Rorem called Boulanger “The most important teacher since Socrates.”
Aaron Copland, who will be featured in our final Virtual Visionaries post with a remote performance of his iconic work Quiet City, was among the first students of Boulanger at the Conservatoire Américain at Fontainebleau in 1921. In later years, he wrote to his former teacher to express his gratitude: “I shall count our meeting the most important of my musical life. Whatever I have accomplished is intimately associated in my mind with those early years, and with what you have since been as inspiration and example.”
Philip Glass, when considering his own studies with Boulanger in the mid-60’s, said of the experience, “I’m sure that I couldn’t write the music that I’m writing today without that (training), it simply would be too difficult to do…”
In fact, Glass discusses his studies and regimen with Boulanger in some detail in a previous Virtual Visionaries presentation In Conversation with Philip Glass.
A native of Lodz, Poland, Grażyna Bacewicz (1909 – 1969) travelled to Paris to study with Nadia Boulanger in 1932 on the advice of her professor at the Warsaw Conservatory, Karol Szymanowski. Both she and Boulanger shared a love for the music of Stravinsky and Bacewicz’s scores from this period reflect that neoclassical influence.
Bacewicz’s musical style continued to evolve over time, from “her own mature neoclassical style created during her middle period, 1944-1958, to a period of stylistic experimentation with sonorism, 12-tone techniques, aleatoricism, and collage,” this according to the Polish Music Center of the University of Southern California.
Sonata No. 2 for solo violin that we’re featuring today dates from 1958, on the cusp of Bacewicz’s experimental phase. Just as Bach and Paganini had challenged the limits of the instruments of their times, so too, Bacewicz, herself a professional violinist, expanded the violin repertoire with new sounds and innovative techniques.
I spoke with Kinga about some of the demands and challenges of the work:
“It’s oftentimes a combination of simple elements, as well as their timing that Grażyna Bacewicz uses to achieve interesting sound effects. For instance, in the finale of the Sonata #2, she combines double stops with chromatic glissandos (slides up and down) and spiccato (off the string) bowing, creating an innovative technique I have not seen in any other violin works. She generally uses lots of open strings (of course in her own way) that add some dissonance and/or help achieve a folk-like character. Whatever she does, it’s never redundant. When an ear has been given enough time to get accustomed to a particular sound, she will certainly throw in something new and unexpected to keep the listeners on the edge of their seats.” - Kinga Augustyn, violinist
Grażyna Bacewicz, "herself a professional violinist."
Grażyna Bacewicz
Here now, Kinga Augustyn performing Sonata No. 2 for solo violin by Grażyna Bacewicz:
As a special feature and a follow-up to this unique work, Kinga has prepared a presentation in which she demonstrates the various techniques called for by composer:
Grazyna Bacewicz
Finally, Grażyna Bacewicz, in her own words:
“I do not agree with a statement that I hear quite often that if a composer discovered his own musical language he should adhere to this language and write in his own style. Such an approach to this matter is completely foreign to me, it is identical with the resignation from progress, from development. Each work completed today becomes the past yesterday. A progressive composer would not agree to repeat even himself. He has to not only deepen and perfect his achievements, but also broaden them. It seems to me, that for instance in my music, though I do not consider myself an innovator, one can notice a continuous line of development. […] My compositional workshop and the emergence of the work is for me something personal and intimate. Contemporary composers, and at least a considerable number of them, have a different stance. They explain what system they used, in what way they arrived at something. I do not do that. I think that the matter of the way by which one arrived at something is, for the listeners, unimportant. What matters is the final result, that is the work itself. ”
— from a 1964 interview for Polish Radio, published in Ruch Muzyczny 33 No.3 (1989)
One of the qualities attributed to master teacher Nadia Boulanger was her uncanny ability to recognize a composer’s true “voice.” This was confirmed for me while I was in college when Eastman graduate Charles Strouse, composer of the Broadway musicals Bye, Bye Birdie and Annie (among many others) came to speak to the composition department. He relayed his own experiences studying with Nadia Boulanger and how she steered him away from pursuing “serious” music and encouraged him to embrace his own special talent for writing lighter fare.
Astor Piazzolla. Click to Enlarge
Astor Piazzolla (1921 - 1992) the next featured composer in today’s Violin Visionaries concert tells a similar tale:
“…When I met (Boulanger), I showed her my kilos of symphonies and sonatas. She started to read them and suddenly came out with a horrible sentence: ‘It’s very well written’ … After a long while she said: ‘Here you are like Stravinsky, like Bartók, like Ravel, but you know what happens? I can’t find Piazzolla in this.’
And she began to investigate my private life: what I did, what I did and did not play, if I was single, married or living with someone, she was like an FBI agent! And I was very ashamed to tell her I was a tango musician. She kept asking: ‘You say you are not a pianist. What instrument do you play then?’ And I didn’t want to tell her that I was a bandoneón player…
Finally, I confessed and she asked me to play some bars of a tango of my own. She suddenly opened her eyes, took my hand and told me: ‘You idiot, that’s Piazzolla!’ And I took all the music I composed, ten years of my life, and sent it to hell in two seconds…”
— from Astor Piazzolla: A Memoire
Piazzolla went on to revolutionize the traditional tango creating a new style termed Nuevo tango, incorporating elements from jazz and classical music, establishing himself as the world’s foremost composer of tango music.
Kinga Augustyn continues now with Tango Etude No. 4 for solo violin by Astor Piazzolla:
As we near the close of our Violin Visionaries program, we revisit the world of Marcella Sembrich and her circle of friends and acquaintances. Among them was Fritz Kreisler (1875 -1962), an Austrian-born violinist and composer, one of the most highly-regarded performing artists of his day. “To the wonderful and unique Marcella Sembrich,” wrote Kreisler in an autograph dated 1927, “From her friend and fervent admirer, Fritz Kreisler.” Though the composer’s Recitativo and Scherzo-Caprice dates from 1911, it evokes the memory of an earlier time…of an Old World Vienna that Sembrich herself might have recognized from her youth.
Violin always proved an essential element of Sembrich’s early years---from the crude wooden instrument built for her by her father Kasimir when she was six---through to her virtuosic performance of Dé Beriot’s Seventh Violin Concerto at the Metropolitan Opera Gala when she was twenty-six. “Never do I recollect a time when music was not the chief interest in my life,” mused Sembrich.
Fritz Kreisler.
Marcella Sembrich, 1879: "Every note that I sing comes at the end of a bow." Painting on ivory by I.C. Mackeown, from The Sembrich Collection.
Though Marcella Sembrich eventually put the violin aside to focus on opera, the discipline and training of her early violin studies always remained with her. "Every note that I sing comes at the end of a bow," stated the soprano in later years, referring to the manner in which her early training as a violinist influenced her subsequent musical phrasing as a singer.
To conclude our Violin Visionaries program, Recitative and Scherzo-Caprice for Solo Violin, Op. 6 by Fritz Kreisler, Kinga Augustyn, violin:
On behalf of The Sembrich Board of Directors and staff, we’re pleased to acknowledge the generous sponsorship of this Violin Visionaries program by the Touba Family Foundation. In closing, we want to relay our heartfelt thanks to Kinga Augustyn for sharing so generously of her time and talent in preparing this special program.
Until next time,
Richard Wargo
Artistic Director
Kinga Augustyn is a New York City-based virtuoso concert violinist and recording artist. Ms. Augustyn has a large repertoire of more than 40 concerti, both standard and lesser–known, that she has performed with such orchestras as the German Kammerorchester Berlin and the Wroclaw Philharmonic. Augustyn’s expanding discography on major labels such as Naxos, includes the Paganini Caprices, which music critics consider as convincing as Perlman’s or Midori’s, and an “an enduring benchmark” (Classical Net). “Stylish and vibrant” (The Strad Magazine), and “beyond amazing, one hell of a violinist!” (The Fanfare Magazine), Kinga Augustyn is often praised for her musical interpretations. Music Web International describes her recording of the Bruch Violin Concerto with the Janacek Philharmonic as “extremely moving and expressive,” characterized by “beauty, richness and smoothness of her tone,” and as “music she responds to on a deeply personal and emotional level.”
Augustyn has performed as a soloist with orchestras in the United States, Europe and Asia, including the Deutsches Kammerorchester Berlin, Magdeburg Philharmonic Orchestra, the Chamber Orchestra Leopoldinum, the Wrocław Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Riverside Symphonia. She has toured China and performed at China’s most prestigious venues such as the Beijing Poly Theater and Shanghai Oriental Art Center. Other venues she has appeared at as a recitalist or chamber musician include both the Stern Auditorium and the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Aspen Music Festival, and Chicago Cultural Center. In addition to concerti with orchestras and recitals with piano, she frequently performs unaccompanied solo violin recitals.
Augustyn’s most recent recording was released in 2019 by Naxos, and it features world premieres by the contemporary Polish composer Romuald Twardowski (b. 1930) performed with the Torun Symphony Orchestra and maestro Mariusz Smolij. Augustyn, who has proven her commitment to increasing awareness of music by Polish composers, had previously made a significant contribution to Polish music by recording the Polish Violin Music, a highly praised, “fascinating” (The Strad) album of lesser-known Polish composers. Augustyn’s other recent and critically acclaimed recordings include the Telemann 12 Fantasias for Solo Violin (Centaur Records), in which “her interpretations are convincing in every piece here, and the Baroque spirit of the violin and Telemann’s mastery abiding throughout” (Music Web International); and Glen Roven’s Runaway Bunny Concerto performed with Catherine Zeta-Jones as a narrator and featuring Kinga Augustyn’s Solo Violin Cadenza (GPR Records). Her “exquisite playing” (Music Web International) is often praised for the profundity, deft phrasing, beautiful tone, mastery of the bow, and perfect intonation. “With completely secure technical control, she couples a tapestry of tone color to her innate musicality” (The Fanfare Magazine). Ms. Augustyn is an advocate of new music and premieres and records new works, oftentimes written especially for her. A new album of contemporary works will be released in the Fall of 2020 on Centaur Records.
Ms. Augustyn has won international awards, including First Prizes at the Alexander & Buono International String Competition (NYC), Artist International Presentations (NYC), J. S. Bach String Competition (Zielona Gora, Poland), and the 2017 "Young Poland" contest in Poland. Other top honors include prizes at the Johannes Brahms International Competition (Poertschach, Austria) and the Kloster Schoental International Young Artist Competition (Kloster Scheontal, Germany).
Ms. Augustyn studied at The Juilliard School with Dorothy DeLay, Cho-Liang Lin, and Naoko Tanaka, earning both a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree. She also holds a doctorate from Stony Brook University where she worked with Phil Setzer and Pamela Frank.
Kinga Augustyn plays on a violin made by Joseph Gagliano in 1774, generously on loan from a private collector.
