I have a deep fondness for recordings from the Silesian Guitar Autumn. Thanks to albums documenting past editions of the festival in Tychy, I have discovered interpretations by outstanding guitarists such as Marcin Dylla, Roman Viazovskiy and Kostas Kotsiolis which have become profoundly important to me. The festival’s guests have shaped my artistic preferences, and because of them I have become deeply involved in the world of classical guitar.
With the conviction that I am not alone in my feelings, and in the hope that a new audience will be able to admire the guitar, I reached for the album Śląska Jesień Gitarowa 2024 – the showcase of the biennial in Tychy. Comparing albums from recent editions with those from a dozen or several dozen years ago, one can observe the direction of the festival’s development: once dominated by solo guitar recitals, it is now more strongly enriched by influences from Latin, Spanish, jazz, early, and contemporary music.
A striking opening is provided by Santuário by Yamandu Costa, a brilliant guitarist performing native Brazilian music, who had also appeared in Tychy in 2022. His concerts are characterized by virtuosity, energy and unrestrained joy of music-making. This time, he also performed in a duo with his compatriot Alessandro Penezzi, with whom he played the compositions Capitão do Mato i Chico Balanceado from their joint album Quebranto.
The album of the Tychy-based festival also includes recordings by soloists: the outstanding Anabel Montesinos (her stylishly performed Prelude from Lute Sonata No. 5 in G major by Sylvius Leopold Weiss, the noble and romantic La Catedral by Agustín Barrios, and the passionate Milonga de Don Taco by Cacho Tirao); Cassie Martin – the winner of the International Memorial Guitar Competition accompanying the festival in 2022 (her sensitive performances of Sonata in E major, K.380/L.23 by Domenico Scarlatti and Junto al Generalife by Joaquín Rodrigo); and Marco Piperno (his expressive performance of Allegro ritmico from the twentieth-century Sonata No. 1 by Dušan Bogdanović).
The return to the Romantic style is reflected in a selection from Leoš Janáček’s On an Overgrown Path, performed by Guitar4mation (Campbell Diamond, Michał Nagy, Petr Saidl, Martin Schwarz) – a guitar quartet which regularly appears at the Tychy festival. The spatial sound and excellent interplay of the musicians were also reflected in the jazzy Syrah by Thomas Fellow.
A longstanding tradition of the festival is to support the creation of new music, especially concerts for guitar and orchestra. In 2024, this culminated in the nuanced Episodic Concerto for guitar, percussion and strings by Aleksander Nowak. The outstanding premiere performance by Łukasz Kuropaczewski, accompanied by the AUKSO Chamber Orchestra of the City of Tychy under the baton of Marek Moś, was recorded in its entirety on the album in question.
There are more works intended for this combination, including a reinterpretation of the famous Concierto de Aranjuez as De Madrugada, Op. 56 (Grammy nominee Mateusz Kowalski accompanied by the Radom Chamber Orchestra conducted by Szymon Morus), Suite concertante for guitar and string orchestra by Piotr Moss (Marcin Kozioł, the Archetti Chamber Orchestra conducted by Maciej Tomasiewicz), and Farewell for clarinet, guitar and string orchestra by Szymon Gołąbek, performed by the artistic director of the event (Marek Nosal – guitar, Roman Widaszek – clarinet, the Archetti Chamber Orchestra conducted by Maciej Tomasiewicz).
Nevertheless, the album is first and foremost a colourful, superbly performed collection of guitar music which may appeal to any music lover. For those who attended the festival, it will be a wonderful memento, while for those who have not yet had the opportunity, it will serve as an invitation to join the October Guitar Festival.
Radosław Wieczorek,
member of the editorial team of the quarterly for classical guitarists Sześć Strun Świata (“Six Strings of the World”)