Poles Take Home Four International Opera Awards!
Set designer Małgorzata Szczęśniak, ‘Paria’ by composer Stanisław Moniuszko, breakdancing opera singer Jakub Józef Orliński and opera director David Pountney have received Oscars of the opera world – International Opera Awards.
The International Opera Awards ceremony was held on Monday, 10th May 2021, as a virtual event. Opera lovers from around the globe were able to join the festivities online as the long-awaited 2020 winners were announced and to celebrate the resilience of the opera world in the face of the pandemic.
Designer of the Year
The first Polish International Opera Award (IOA) went to Polish set designer Małgorzata Szczęśniak, whose most recent work includes the production of Richard Strauss's Salome directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski at the Bayerische Staatsoper. Rzeczpospolita daily newspaper critic Jacek Marczyński described the world created by Szczęśniak as a vision:
Instead of King Herod's Palace in Jerusalem, we see a study filled to the brim with books. Instead of a sensual, hot night, one feels a claustrophobic darkness.
Recording of the Year
The opera world’s young phenomenon, the breakdancing opera singer Jakub Józef Orliński, received the Recording (Solo Recital) of the Year award for his album Facce d’Amore, published by Erato. Facce d'Amore presents operatic arias depicting portraits of a Baroque era-lover – not only his delight and joy but also his anger and madness. Among the arias found by Orliński, many of them have never been recorded before – the album features eight new releases.
In previous years, the countertenor was recognised by The Telegraph as one of the ten most charming opera artists in the world, and was awarded the German music industry award Opus Klassik, as well as earned the title of Young Artist of the Year by Gramophone.
Rediscovered Work of the Year
The Rediscovered Work of the Year award was given to Polish composer Stanisław Moniuszko's Paria staged by the Grand Theatre in Poznań. The performance was directed by Graham Vick and conducted by Gabriel Chmura, who sadly passed away in November 2020.
The story presented in Moniuszko's opera alludes to the drama written by Casimir Delavigne, the then-widely-read French writer. It’s a love story that criticises both the caste system and the oppression of the lower classes. The story of pariahs, members of the lower classes, is a metaphor in which one can find references to the relations prevailing in many societies in 19th-century Europe.
Leadership in Opera
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David Pountney, photo: PAP
The Leadership in Opera award was presented to David Pountney, the former artistic director of the prestigious Bregenzer Festspiele festival (2003-2014), as well as the Welsh National Opera (2011-2019). Pountney was awarded the Knight's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland, he has repeatedly staged Polish operas such as King Roger, The Haunted Manor, The Passenger, The Merchant of Venice. In 2018, he was granted Polish citizenship.
Previous successes
The International Opera Awards were created by opera-lover Harry Hyman in 2012. The jury of the award consists of artists. opera directors, music critics and musicologists. The chairman of the 45-person jury is John Allison, the editor-in-chief of Opera Magazine.
These are, of course, not the first Polish successes in the history of the International Opera Awards. In 2015, Aleksandra Kurzak won the Audience Award. In 2017, the award in the Rediscovered Work of the Year category was awarded to Władysław Żeleński's Goplana, staged at the Teatr Wielki – Polish National Opera by Janusz Wiśniewski. A year later, the International Opera Awards were presented to Mariusz Treliński and Piotr Beczała. In 2019, the prestigious awards went to the production of The House of the Dead by Fiodor Dostoyevsky, directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski and to Waldemar Dąbrowski.
Originally written in Polish, trans. NR, 11 May 2021
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