The Symphony Orchestra of the Opole Philharmonic in southern Poland embarks on an extensive tour of the United States.
It begins on Saturday in Aiken, South Carolina, and ends on 20 March in Sacramento, California, with a total of 46 concerts in 19 states, including such major centres as New York, Boston, Chicago, St. Louis, Atlanta, Phoenix, and San Diego.
The Opole Philharmonic is the second Polish orchestra, after the Warsaw Philharmonic, to have been invited to the United States by the prestigious Columbia Artists Management Inc. (CAMI).
The orchestra will present six different programmes, comprising works by Brahms, Beethoven, Liszt, Richard Strauss and Mozart, as well as Polish composers – Fryderyk Chopin, Henryk Wieniawski, Ignacy Jan Paderewski and Stanisław Moniuszko. The soloists include Marta Kowalczyk, an up-and-coming Polish violinist.
In all the concerts, the Opole Philharmonic will be conducted by its Music Director Bogusław Dawidow. He told the Polish Press Agency that when two years ago an e-mail came from CAMI with a preliminary proposal of a tour, he thought it was a joke, as the orchestra had had no contact with the agency before.
"I am convinced the tour will mark a milestone in the history of the Opole Philharmonic. We’ve been working hard on raising our musical skills for almost a decade and now is the time to enter the international circuit and demonstrate that Poland has more top-calibre ensembles than the Warsaw Philharmonic and the National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice," he said. (mk)