In 1990, the first post-communist year in Poland, Gwyn Pritchard was invited to the Warsaw Autumn Festival to conduct his own and other British music.  He was also commissioned by the magazine Classical Music to write a brief article on the event, and by the BBC to write the scripts and introduce two programmes for Radio 3 about the return to Poland of the composer Andrej Panufnik.  As there is still considerable interest in that momentous year, in both the politics and therefore also the arts, Pritchard's texts are reproduced here (with essential cuts and editorial modifications).

THE WARSAW AUTUMN FESTIVAL 1990
Gwyn Pritchard in conversation with Polish musicians

 In the course of its thirty-four year history the Warsaw Autumn Festival has unquestionably become one of the World's foremost contemporary musical events. So when invited to conduct a concert, with my Ensemble 'Uroboros', at this years Festival (Sept.14-23) it was an ideal opportunity to ask some of its organisers about the event, its past and future. Its origins lie in the need felt in Poland in 1956 to experience musical developments and understandings that had been surpressed by the cultural stranglehold of the Stalinist era, and also to reflect the current state of Polish music. This dual role has characterised the Festival ever since. As Josef Patkowski, once chairman of the Festival, put it: "There is such a vast and diverse production of contemporary music, so many important works of different aesthetics that are not known in Poland, that the only way to get to know this music is to present it in number. At the more didactic level, you experience music differently in the context of other music." 

Now, of course, everything is changing in Poland; and it remains to be seen how the Autumn Festival will change. Communist policy included generous arts subsidies, and the Festival, with its international profile, was guaranteed support. But the harsher realities of free-market economy are already provoking debate about what can be done if the state funding dries up. Pawel Szymanski, one of Poland's most prominent younger composers, remarked "Fortunately this year we received enough money from the government, but I am afraid that it will not be possible to go on that way. We have to look for sponsors otherwise we will be forced to reduce the Festival. On the other hand finding private sponsors in our country is hopeless because simply there are no big companies with money."  

Another talking point this year was the return to Poland of Andrzej Panufnik for the Festival's presentation of no less than eleven of his works. It seemed strange to many of the non-Polish visitors that Panufnik's relatively conservative music should feature so prominently in a festival which has always been primarily concerned with new developments in music around the world. Composers presented in a retrospective dimension at past Festivals have usually been established twentieth-century 'masters', and few people would make that claim for Panufnik. As a one time persona-non-grata in Poland, was his presence more political than artistic? But as Patkowski pointed out: "The balance, perspective and development of the event is aimed directly at the Polish audience. After the war the two great talents in Poland were Lutoslawski and Panufnik, and because he left we have (since 1977) heard only a few scattered works of his. I think that it was very risky but very important that, with his presence, we performed the most important stuff that he has written in the meantime. I can say now 'I know what I like and what I don't; I understand the development of his idiom.' It closes a chapter." Szymanski made a further point: "The Festival is organised by the Composers' Union. In the Stalin era there was a lot of ugly propaganda against Panufnik after he left Poland, and I regret to say that some of the members of the Union also made this propaganda, and he was kicked out of it; so it is important that the Union gives him justice now." But composer, and member of the repertory committee, Rafal Augustyn added that there was also dissent: "There were some voices heard saying that we should abstain from coming to his concerts, do something in protest. But they were rather limited; it's too late for resentments." So given this exposure is there now a new perspective on his music in Poland? Augustyn feels: "For the worse", adding "it's a type of music that cannot be played in a big amount".

Augustyn also talked about this year's other featured composer, George Crumb, seven of whose pieces were presented. "Crumb was a sort of cult figure here in the seventies, and at every Warsaw Autumn we had some of his pieces. Slavionic audiences were perhaps looking for mysticism. In the sixties, when new spiritual movements emerged in the West, we were much more involved in politics than the soul. When it appeared in the polished form of Crumb's music it made a great impact. He offered both something that we lacked and something that we were accustomed to - a very precisely elaborated structure of symbols which was absent in the straight-forwardness of Polish music; but on the other hand the theatrical elements and the graphic structure of his scores were perhaps along the same lines as the Polish school. In the 1980s he wasn't so widely played here, so it's sort of a return to the old tradition."

The 1990 Festival also presented an interesting mix of British composers: Birtwistle, Martland, Pritchard, Finnissy and Gifford. However, Augustyn says that "despite the frequent appearances of British ensembles here we know rather little about British music. It is like a blurred image." Szymansky expanded on this point: "Maybe one reason is that festivals are not always the best place to listen to music because you hear so many pieces, and of course you remember the extravagant and spectacular ones but forget some interesting pieces which are not so extravagant. Although you can't say that there is some common style, I would say that British music is not spectacular, but sometimes very interesting."

However, as the response to both the Arditti Quartet and Uroboros Ensemble showed, British performers are clearly held in the highest regard. It was gratifying to hear Augustyn spontaneously say of my Uroboros colleagues "Everybody said that the Ensemble is marvellous, clearly the concert is among the highlights of the Festival. It stands in the first rank and will be remembered." Let's hope the Festival can remain 'in the first rank', and not be reduced by history to just a memory.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

THE RETURN OF ANDRZEJ PANUFNIK TO POLAND

My association with the Warsaw Aurtumn Festival and Poland go back to 1979.  Since then I have returned a number of times for performances of my music, and on each occasion I have found myself engaged in animated conversations with Polish musicians, which revealed to me the seriousness and intensity with which they are constantly re-examining the meaning and directions of their own musical activities, especially in the context of what is happening beyond the boundaries of Poland.  So when invited to return there for the 1990 Autumn Festival, to conduct my own and other British works, I knew for sure that I could expect some extremely excited discussion in the light of the recent tumultuous events in Poland and the rest of Eastern Europe.

By far the most intense debate was in connection with the return to Poland of Panufnik, who had left the country in 1954, and in consequence his music had for many years been banned there.  Ever since then attitudes to Panufnik and his music have been, and remain, sharply divided, both in Poland and beyond.  Whilst his many supporters may regard him as a composer of real originality and importance whose moral and political integrity is beyond question, there are others who would argue that he never fulfilled the promise suggested by his adventurous early works,  and there are people who feel that his motives for leaving Poland need to be more closely examined.  That question, however pertinent it may be to certain Poles, is one that it would be presumptuous for us in the West, who did not endure Stalinist oppression, to comment upon without detailed knowledge of Panufnik’s personal situation.  What we can say is that very few well known composers have died with their profile so unclear.

It seemed strange to many of us non-Polish visitors that Panufnik's seemingly conservative music should feature so prominently in a festival which has always been primarily concerned with new developments in music around the world.  Composers presented in a retrospective dimension at past Festivals have usually been securely established twentieth-century 'masters', who had in some way radically effected the course of musical developments, and few people would make that claim for Panufnik. 

As a one time persona-non-grata in Poland, was his presence more political than artistic, especially at this critical point in Poland's history?   But to quote Joseph Patkowski, an eminent Polish musicologist and former Festival director: "The balance, perspective and development of the event is aimed directly at the Polish audience.  After the war the two great talents in Poland were Lutoslawski and Panufnik, and because he left we have (since 1977) heard only a few scattered works of his.  I think that it was very risky but very important that, with his presence, we performed the most important stuff that he has written in the meantime.  I can say now 'I know what I like and what I don't; I understand the development of his idiom.  It closes a chapter." 

It is important to realise that only two years after Panufnik had left Poland all stylistic censorship of music was lifted, and as long as there was no overt political content, composers were free to write what they wanted.  Had he given up his homeland for nothing?  The changes in Poland were to lead to the progressive developments of the Polish 'avante-garde' in the 1960s; yet Panufnik, living in the West, felt out of step with all progressive tendencies (both Western and Polish) of those times.  Had musical progress overtaken him?  Or was he right in seeing new developments as passing gimmicks?  This point is particularly pertinent at the moment when much argument surrounds the emergence of so called 'New-Romantic' and other 'post-modern' tendencies.  There are even some younger composers now revealing an aesthetic not too far from that of Panufnik's.  Conversely, there is another prevailing line of thought which regards such attitudes as, to quote the musicologist Richard Toop, the 'New Capitulationism', implying a lack of courage to face the musical challenges of our time; and there are several other shades of opinion between these two extremes.  As the debate develops it will be interesting to see if the uncertainties that I referred to earlier, associated with Panufnik's status as a composer, begin to become clearer.  Was he, as some people feel, a major figure who deliberately chose to remain detached from passing musical fashions? Or, as others speculate, did his seperation from his homeland leave him isolated and musically out of touch with a changing world?

Despite Panufnik's remark that his music is 'essentially abstract' we find numerous indications that he was deeply concerned with the notion of self-expression, suggesting a composer with a fundamentally romantic view of music.  Not only do his scores frequently include such directions as 'with passion', 'expressively', and so on; but his own comments often remind us that he specifically wanted, through his music, to share his own emotional experiences with his listeners.  Such ideas about music are certainly finding plenty of advocates again now.  But shortly after his arrival in Britain, although far from alone his beliefs, he found that these views were to leave him musically isolated.  In consequence, during the sixties, Panufnik's music was neglected by the British contemporary music establishment, which was perhaps more interested in encouraging a new generation of younger composers who reflected the small but growing interest in the innovative musical tendencies that were slowly spreading from Europe.  There was also a commitment to shaking off the stranglehold of the conservatively provincial musical tradition in Britain; and against this background Panufnik's music seemed not to share in the exploratory spirit of the time, but was generally felt to be both too rhetorical in its language and too subjective in content.

It's probably fair to say that Panufnik's reputation in Britain never fully recovered from these years; but the polarisation of musical attitudes at that time, and the insecurity of new emerging ideas, was bound to give rise to propogandist attitudes, as people fought to support their particular musical beliefs.  Such attitudes must have been very painful for Panufnik who had recently fled a country dominated by propoganda and a deliberate unwillingness to look for the truth.

It is certainly true that in Poland the general population is far more aware and interested in topical events in music and the arts than we are accustomed to here in Britain; so it was not entirely surprising that as Panufnik came to the podium to conduct the opening concert of the Festival, devoted entirely to his music, the audience rose to its feet to welcome him back to his former homeland. This was a more significant event than one might think, as it was widely known that there were also a number of opponents to Panufnik's presence - people who felt that his leaving Poland many years earlier had been a betrayal rather than a protest.  As composer and member of the repertory committee Rafal Augustyn told me: "There were some voices heard saying that we should abstain from coming to his concerts, do something in protest; but they were rather limited; it's too late for resentments." Once again one was reminded of the highly charged political climate.

Ultimately, of course, the best tribute anyone can offer a composer is to give his music a chance and to listen to it seriously.  Only that way can one really decide what kind of a figure we are concerned with; and interesting as political matters may be in Panufnik's case, they are at best relevant background information, and at the worst misleading anecdote.  Although I am a composer of music which is in all respects radically different from that of Panufnik's, I feel it is important to restate that the kind of prejudice (musical and otherwise) from which Panufnik suffered frequently is in no one's interests, including those people who do not regard his music highly.

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