Nowadays, the oeuvre of Polish composers active in the 19th century can be considered one of the most fascinating chapters in the history of our national music. In recent years, works of many of them have experienced a welldeserved renaissance, which is reflected in their increasingly marked presence in concert halls and among reciordings, which, in turn, is a direct result of intense research activity of musicologists as well as of the considerable interest of performers, who are more and more keen to include those pieces in their repertoires.
The present album contains the world phonographic premiere of Józef Nowakowski’s Duo in A Major for Violin and Piano, Op. 18, dedicated to Karol Lipiński and composed in 1841, as well as his Piano Quintet in E-flat Major, Op. 17, a work that can be compared to the masterpieces of the greatest artists active in the first half of the 19th century (Franz Schubert or Robert Schumann). To complement the album, the artists chose a chamber music arrangement of the Prelude in E Minor, Op. 28 No. 4 by Fryderyk Chopin arranged by Jerzy Cembrzyński. The arrangement follows the convention of popular music, which is quite an unexpected contrast to the works discussed earlier. © DUX Records