BIO
ŁUKASZ BOROWICZ – CONDUCTOR
Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Poznań Philharmonic, Principal Guest Conductor of the Cracow Philharmonic. One of the most versatile conductors of his generation, Łukasz Borowicz regularly leads the major European orchestras in the core Germanic repertoire as well as important Central and Eastern-European works. He conducts opera and has received numerous prizes for his over 120 recordings. From 2007 to 2015 he was Chief Conductor of the Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Warsaw, and from 2006 to 2021 he was Principal Guest Conductor of the Poznań Philharmonic.
In the 23/24 season Borowicz debuts with Israel Chamber Orchestra and returns for concerts and recordings to Teatro Real, PKF – Prague Philharmonia, DSO Berlin, L’Opéra Orchestre national Montpellier Occitanie, Basque National Orchestra, Pardubice Chamber Orchestra, Warsaw Philharmonic, National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra (Katowice), Szczecin Philharmonic, and Teatr Wielki – National Opera of Poland (world premiere of the opera Dead End by Krzysztof Meyer).
In the 2020-2023 seasons Borowicz made his debuts with Israel Philharmonic, Orquestra Titular del Teatro Real (Madrid), Chœur de l’Opéra national du Rhin, Orchestre symphonique de Mulhouse, Brandenburger Symphoniker and returned to WDR Sinfonieorchester, Staatskapelle Halle, Orchestre National de Lillle, L’Opéra Orchestre national Montpellier Occitanie, PKF -Prague Philharmonia, Prague Symphony Orchestra FOK, Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra (Ostrava) among others.
Łukasz Borowicz has appeared as guest conductor and recorded with London Philharmonic Orchestra, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Paris Opera (Les Huguenots), Akademie für Alte Musik, RIAS Kammerchor, SWR Sinfonieorchester, Bamberger Symphoniker. Gürzenich-Orchester Köln, Düsseldorfer Symphoniker, Hamburger Symphoniker, MDR Sinfonieorchester, Luzerner Symfonieorchester, Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra, Queensland Symphony Orchestra, Trondheim Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic New Music Group and a number of other orchestras and ensembles, including all the major Polish symphonies. He has led concerts at the Rossini Festival in Pesaro, Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival and Kissinger Sommer Festival, and has an ongoing relationship with the Beethoven Easter Festival in Warsaw, which has seen twenty rarely played operas performed to date.
Borowicz made his operatic debut at Polish National Opera with Don Giovanni, which has been followed by over 190 performances at the house including several premieres. Recent opera premieres include a new production of Moniuszko’s Halka at the Theater an der Wien and the Teatr Wielki – National Opera of Poland as well as Janacek’s Journal d’un disparu and de Falla’s El amor brujo at the Opéra national du Rhin.
Borowicz’s recordings have been awarded four Diapason d’Or prizes. Symphonic recordings include the complete Violin Concertos by Grażyna Bacewicz (Chandos), the Complete Symphonic Works by Andrzej Panufnik (cpo), and several titles for Hyperion. The final installment of the Panufnik cycle was selected as an Editor’s Choice by Gramophone magazine, and Borowicz received the ICMA Special Achievement Award in 2015 for his pioneering work on the cycle. In 2018 he received another ICMA award for his recording of Quo Vadis by Feliks Nowowiejski (cpo). His collaboration with Piotr Beczała on Deutsche Grammophon’s recording Heart’s delight – Songs of Richard Tauber was met with wide critical and public praise. Recent DVD of Moniuszko’s Halka (Unitel) was awarded Critic’s Choice of the Opera News (July 2022). Ongoing recording projects include release of Hugo Alfven’s Complete Symphonies with the DSO Berlin as well as Bacewicz’s Complete Symphonic Works with WDR Sinfonieorchester (cpo).
Born in Warsaw in 1977, Łukasz Borowicz graduated from the Frederic Chopin Music Academy, where he studied under Bogusław Madey. He has received the Polityka Passport Award (2008), Coryphée of Polish Music Award (2011), Norwid Award (2013) and Tansman Prize honouring an outstanding musical personality (2014) as well as Honorary Award of Polish Composers Union (2021).
Łukasz Borowicz is a Professor of the Krzysztof Penderecki Academy of Music in Cracow.
Heroic performances from the LPO and Łukasz Borowicz
I had not previously seen the Polish conductor perform but I was impressed – by the unfussy attentiveness to score and soloist in Penderecki’s Concerto and by the lithe freedom of his interpretation and rendering of Prokofiev’s Fifth Symphony (1944).
“Crowned by an exalted performance of Penderecki’s Second Violin Concerto, played by the dedicatee Anne-Sophie Mutter in the presence of the composer, the London Philharmonic’s closing concert of its current season took excellence and courageous programme planning to levels of expectation and emotional intensity more than once defying belief. Here was an orchestra in terrific form, working with a new conductor, Łukasz Borowicz, rising to every challenge, playing with a finesse, exchange, discipline and dynamic sophistication that excited the familiar and clarified the unfamiliar. Borowicz, formerly chief conductor of the Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Warsaw, coaxed his players to listen as individuals and respond as a regiment. A secure presence on the podium, elegant and attentive, not unduly flamboyant, with a clear beat, he’s a musician who on this showing thinks in graceful, shaped phrases placed within long paragraphs. He got the strings to dig deep, bottom upwards, creating warmly bedded foundations, the more gravitationally powerful and vibrationally nuanced for the addition of pitch-less percussion (bass drum most obviously) in the Prokofiev Symphony. He brought a bright edge to the woodwind, and allowed the brass to relish the limelight, virtuosity razor-sharp and rhythmically tensioned. Whatever his secret, his rehearsal technique, he got the LPO to speak and take to the mountain highs, here coasting, now taking the bit, there opening the throttle like a Bugatti thundering down the straight in full-throated roar. Yes, some concert…
The success is largely due to Lukasz Borowicz, 38 year-old Polish conductor, (…) already holder of an extensive discography: he’s obviously at ease with this repertoire. He conducts the whole concert with baffling ardor and control and it’s hard to know where to start when it comes to praising the precision of the rhythms, the acute sense of contrast and dynamic, or the sharp attention he pays to soloists. Thanks to him, the flawless Orchestre National des Pays de la Loire is glowing, with a string section in a state of grace.
An excellent conductor… extremely gifted
We will be hearing a lot more of Lukasz Borowicz
Das ORF Radiosymphonieorchester Wien spielte zwar wohltuend unprätentiös, ließ nie falsche Sentimentalität aufkommen, schien sich jedoch oft in Moniuszkos Melodieschleifen zu verlieren, ohne auf dramaturgische Zuspitzungen zuzusteuern. Das lag zweifellos an Łukasz Borowicz am Pult, dem es erst im Finale gelang, auch den tragischen Hintergrund dieser liedhaft-schlichten Musik hervorzuheben. Da erst zeigte sich, dass Moniuszko durchaus von Carl Maria von Weber inspiriert wurde.
The ORF Radiosymphonieorchester Wien performed pleasantly unpretentious, never let false sentimentality arise, but often seemed to get lost in Moniuszko’s melody without heading for dramaturgical exaggerations. That was undoubtedly due to Łukasz Borowicz on the podium, who only managed to highlight the tragic background of this song-like, simple music in the finale. Only then did it become clear that Moniuszko was definitely inspired by Carl Maria von Weber.