Professor Antoni Wit

Con­duc­tor, Pro­fes­sor of Music Arts

Born in Cra­cow where he received a com­pre­hen­sive gen­eral and musi­cal edu­ca­tion. He stud­ied at the State Col­lege of Music in Cra­cow at the Depart­ment of Com­po­si­tion, The­ory and Con­duct­ing. He majored and grad­u­ated with hon­ours from Hen­ryk Czyż‘s con­duct­ing class in 1967. Par­al­lel to his music stud­ies, Antoni Wit read law at the Depart­ment of Law, Jagiel­lon­ian Uni­ver­sity where he majored in 1969. He con­tin­ued his music edu­ca­tion at the Ecole Nor­male de Musique in Paris under Pierre Der­vaux and also with Nadia Boulanger (1967–68). He per­fected his con­duct­ing skills in Tan­gle­wood (Mass.) under such famous mas­ters of the baton as Stanisław Skrowaczewski and Seiji Ozawa (1973).

Antoni Wit made his début at the State Phil­har­monic in Cra­cow when he was still a stu­dent (1964). He began his career at the National Phil­har­monic in War­saw as Witold Rowicki’s assis­tant (1967–69). In 1968 he con­ducted the National Phil­har­monic Orches­tra abroad for the first time (France).

A piv­otal event in Antoni Wit’s career was his par­tic­i­pa­tion in the pres­ti­gious Her­bert von Kara­jan Inter­na­tional Con­duct­ing Com­pe­ti­tion in Berlin in 1971 where he won the sec­ond prize. Two years later he assisted Her­bert von Kara­jan at the Easter Fes­ti­val in Salzburg. At the time he was a reg­u­lar con­duc­tor at the Poz­nan Phil­har­monic (1970–72). He also co-operated with the Grand The­atre in War­saw (com­menc­ing from 1970, pre­miers of The Bar­ber of Seville and La Travi­ata) and then the Music The­atre of Malmö (com­menc­ing from 1974, pre­miers of Aida and The Con­sul). He also man­aged the pro­duc­tion of Halka in the NHK, Tokyo (1975) and Teatro Verdi, Tri­este (1982).

Antoni Wit was given the post of Artis­tic Direc­tor for the first time in 1974 (The Pomeran­ian Phil­har­monic). Three years later, he assumed the post of Artis­tic Direc­tor and First Con­duc­tor of the Orches­tra and Choir of the Pol­ish Radio and Tele­vi­sion in Cra­cow. He trav­elled abroad a lot with this orches­tra and also pro­duced many archival record­ings and first per­for­mances (e.g., K. Pen­derecki: Lac­rimosa, Agnus Dei, Te Deum).

Antoni Wit was appointed Direc­tor of the Grand Sym­phony Orches­tra of the Pol­ish Radio and Tele­vi­sion (WOSPRiTV) in Katow­ice in1983 and he was respon­si­ble for the artis­tic out­put of this group for sev­en­teen years dur­ing which he con­ducted the WOSPRiTV dur­ing tours of Ger­many, Bel­gium, France, Den­mark, Fin­land, Italy, Spain, Switzer­land, Yugoslavia, The United King­dom, USA, Hongkong, Korea, Tai­wan and Brasil (91 tours, 352 con­certs). The WOSPRiTV con­ducted by Antoni Wit recorded 96 records. The list of record­ings includes sym­phonies by Tchaikowsky, Mahler, Schu­mann and Pen­derecki; piano con­cer­tos by Brahms, Tchaikowsky, Paderewski, Prokofiev and Rach­mani­nov; sym­phony poems by Liszt, Smetana and Strauss; the works of Górecki and Kilar, Messiaen’s Turangalila-Symphonie and all of Witold Lutosławski’s orches­tra works (9 CDs). He has recorded for e.g., Naxos, EMI-HMV, CBS, Cam­er­ata Tokyo, NVC Arts, Pony Canyon, Pol­skie Nagra­nia, Wifon and EBS Record­ings. He has also recorded 183 pieces (60 hours of music) for the Pol­ish Radio archives. Antoni Wit has remained faith­ful to WOSPiTV, now NOSPR, to this day — he was First Con­duc­tor of the orches­tra in 2000/2001. He has con­ducted the Katow­ice orches­tra at pres­ti­gious con­certs at sev­eral fes­ti­vals in France (“La Roque d’Antheron”), Ger­many (Bad Hers­feld), Lebanon (Al Bus­tan, Beirut) and many impor­tant events in Poland.

For four years Antoni Wit worked with Orques­tra Fil­har­mon­ica de Gran Canaria (Las Pal­mas), first as Music Direc­tor (1987–88) and then as Vis­it­ing Con­duc­tor (1989–92). Since 1 Jan­u­ary 2002 he has been Direc­tor Gen­eral and Artis­tic Direc­tor of the National Phil­har­monic in Warsaw.

He has con­ducted in the most sig­nif­i­cant music cen­tres all over the world. He has con­ducted an impres­sive num­ber of con­certs (more than 1500) with sym­phony and opera orches­tras of great renown (more than 150).

The long list of orches­tras includes:

Berliner Phil­har­moniker, Phil­har­mo­nia Orches­tra Lon­don, Staatskapelle Dres­den, Tokyo Sym­phony Orches­tra, Orches­tra del Teatro Verdi, Tri­este, RAI: Roma, Milano, Torino; La Fenice Orches­tra, Venezia, Teatro di Gen­ova, Teatro Comu­nale di Bologna, RSO Berlin, WDR Köln, SDR Stuttgart, NDR Ham­burg, Orch­ester der Beethoven­halle, Bonn, Dres­d­ner Phil­har­monie, Tam­pere Phil­har­monic Orches­tra, Tivoli Sym­fo­niorkester, Copen­hagen; Malmö Sym­foni Orkester, Radio Fil­har­monisch Ork­est, Hil­ver­sum, Bournemouth Sym­phony Orches­tra, BBC Sym­phony Orches­tra Lon­don, Royal Phil­har­monic Orches­tra, The Lon­don Phil­har­monic Orches­tra, BBC Scot­tish Sym­phony Orches­tra, BBC Welsh Sym­phony Orches­tra, Orches­tra Phil­har­monique de Stras­bourg, Opéra de Mar­seille, Zagreb Phil­har­monic, Orches­tra dell Accad­e­mia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Roma, Orquesta Ciu­dad de Barcelona, Orches­tra Nacional de Espańa, Orquesta Sin­fon­ica del Prin­ci­pado de Asturias, Orquesta Sin­fon­ica de Bil­bao, Istan­bul State Sym­phony Orches­tra, Jerusalem Sym­phony Orches­tra, Kyoto Sym­phony Orches­tra, Tonkun­stlerorch­ester in Wien, Orchestre National de Bel­gique, Orquesta Nacional de Méx­ico, Tonhalle-Orchester Zurich. Bergen Phil­har­monic, Radio Sym­fonie de Asturias, Orquesta Sin­fon­ica de Tener­ife, Kan­sai Phil­har­monic (Osaka), Bam­berger Sym­phoniker, National Sym­phony Orches­tra (Dublin), Budapest Fes­ti­val Orches­tra, Orchestre Sym­phonique de Mon­treal, Orchestre Phil­har­monique du Lux­em­bourg, MDR-Sinfonieorchester Leipzig.

Antoni Wit’s out­stand­ing inter­pre­ta­tions include a num­ber of first world per­for­mances of Pol­ish music:

• 1974 Jan Oleszkiewicz, Con­certo grosso (Warsaw)
• 1980 Krzysztof Pen­derecki, Te Deum (Sandomierz)
• 1980 Krzysztof Pen­derecki Lac­rimosa (Cra­cow)
• 1981 Krzysztof Pen­derecki Agnus Dei (Warsaw)
• 1982 Bro­nisław K. Przy­byl­ski, A Varso­vie (Graz)
• 1983 Woj­ciech Kilar, Vic­to­ria (Katow­ice)
• 1983 Alek­sander Lasoń, Moun­tains (War­saw)
• 1984 Woj­ciech Kilar, Angelus (Katow­ice)
• 1990 Woj­ciech Kilar, Choral Pre­lude (Katow­ice)
• 1993 Krzysztof Meyer, Car­il­lon (Flens­burg)
• 1994 Jacek Doma­gała, Choralis (Berlin)
• 1994 Stanisław Krupow­icz, Fin de sié­cle (War­saw)
• 1995 Paweł Szy­mański, Piano Con­certo (Paris)
• 1995 Włodz­imierz Kotoński, Sym­pho­nia No. 1 (Warsaw)
• 1996 Euge­niusz Knapik, La lib­erta chiama la lib­erta (War­saw)
• 1996 Tadeusz Wielecki, “Id” for Orches­tra (War­saw)
• 1996 Andrzej Dzi­adek, Impres­sion (Katow­ice)
• 1996 Euge­niusz Knapik, Up into the Silence (Copenhagen)
• 2002 Krzysztof Meyer, Con­certo for Clar­inet (Duisburg)
• 2002 Maciej Jabłoński, Sym­phony No. 4 (Warsaw)

Antoni Wit’s artis­tic pro­duc­tions, recorded on more than a hun­dred records by many recog­nised record com­pa­nies, have been highly appraised by lis­ten­ers. This recog­ni­tion is reflected in many awards and cer­tifi­cates of merit.

Awards and cer­tifi­cates of merit:

Artis­tic

• 1982 — award of the Pol­ish Com­posers’ Asso­ci­a­tion for total achievement
• 1983 — award of the Pres­i­dent of the Radio and Tele­vi­sion Com­mit­tee for out­stand­ing artis­tic achievement
• 1984, 1996 — “Orpheus” awards of the Crit­ics sec­tion of the Asso­ci­a­tion of Pol­ish Music Artists for the best ren­der­ing of Pol­ish music at the “War­saw Autumn” Festival
• 1985 — cer­tifi­cate of merit awarded by British crit­ics for the record­ing of Karol Szymanowski’s Sta­bat Mater (record of the year — EMI)
• 1987 — award of the Pres­i­dent of the Radio and Tele­vi­sion Com­mit­tee for the pop­u­lar­i­sa­tion of music on Pol­ish Tele­vi­sion and for artis­tic achieve­ments with the WOSPRiTV
• 1991 — award of the Pres­i­dent of the City of Katow­ice “for out­stand­ing artis­tic achieve­ment and for mak­ing Katow­ice famous through­out the world”
• 1992 — award of Katow­ice tele­vi­sion “for cre­ative co-operation”
• 1993 — “Dia­pa­son d’Or” and “Grand Prix du Disque de la Nou­velle Acad­e­mie du Disque ’92″ for record­ing the com­plete piano con­cer­tos of Serge Prokofiev (for Naxos)
• 1996 — “Dia­pa­son d’Or” and “Grand Prix du Disque” for the CD record­ing of Witold Lutosławski’s music
• 1998 — “Dia­mond Baton” — indi­vid­ual award of the Exec­u­tive Board of Pol­ish radio “for out­stand­ing artis­tic pro­duc­tions, extolling Pol­ish music at home and abroad, and its pop­u­lar­i­sa­tion among mil­lions of lis­ten­ers of Pol­ish Radio”
• 1999 — “Plat­inum Lau­rel of Skill and Com­pe­tence” for 1998 (together with NOSPR)
• 2002 — “Cannes Clas­si­cal Award” — awarded at MIDEM in Cannes for Olivier Messiaen’s Tarungalila-Symphonie, recorded with NOSPR for Naxos
• 2002 — Gold Medal awarded by the Artur Rubin­stein Foundation

National and other awards

• 1972 — Hon­orary medal of the City of Poznań
• 1976 — Medal for out­stand­ing mer­its for the Byd­goszcz Voivodeship
• 1980 — Sil­ver Cross of Merit
• 1980 — Award of the Pres­i­dent of the City of Cracow
• 1982 — Award of the Min­is­ter of For­eign Affairs “for pop­u­lar­is­ing Pol­ish music abroad”
• 1985 — “Mer­i­to­ri­ous Cul­tural Activist” Medal
• 1985 — Knight’s Cross of the Order of Pol­ish Revival

In addi­tion to his inten­sive con­duct­ing activ­i­ties, Antoni Wit also teaches. At first he gave occa­sional mas­ter courses (e.g., the inter­na­tional mas­ter course, Zlin, Czech Repub­lic 1993).

Since 1998 he has been teach­ing a con­duct­ing class at the Fry­deryk Chopin Uni­ver­sity of Music in War­saw. Three FCUM grad­u­ates have stud­ied con­duct­ing under Pro­fes­sor Wit.

In 1998 the Pol­ish Pres­i­dent con­ferred the title of pro­fes­sor of Music Arts on Antoni Wit.

This out­stand­ing con­duc­tor is also invited to sit on com­pe­ti­tion juries. He has been a juror at the Inter­na­tional Con­duct­ing Com­pe­ti­tion in Katow­ice (1983, 1987, 1999) and in Cadaques (1998).