Antoni Wit
Veteran conductor Antoni Wit has been a major champion of Polish contemporary music but also has a wide repertory of music from many countries. He was conductor of the Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Katowice, and then the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra for many years.
Wit (pronounced Vit) was born in Kraków, Poland, on February 7, 1944. He attended the Kraków Academy of Music (then the State Higher Academy of Music), studying conducting with Henryk Czyż and composition with Krzysztof Penderecki. After graduating in 1967, he went on to serve as assistant to Witold Rowicki at the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra while earning a law degree at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków in 1969. He benefited from relatively liberal Polish travel policies and was able to study conducting in Paris with Pierre Dervaux at the Ecole Normale de Musique and composition privately with the famed teacher Nadia Boulanger. Wit went on to attend conducting classes at the Tanglewood Music Center in the U.S. with Stanislaw Skrowaczewski and Seiji Ozawa in 1973. He then became the conductor and artistic director of the Pomeranian Philharmonic Orchestra in Poland from 1974 to 1977, moving on from 1977 to 1983 to the Polish Radio and Television Orchestra and Chorus. During this period, he began a long track record of conducting new Polish music, leading the premiere of Penderecki's Lacrimosa in 1980.
Wit became the conductor of the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Katowice, in 1983, remaining in that position until 2000. With that group, he made his recording debut in 1988 on the Titanic Records label, backing violinist Roman Totenberg in concertos by Brahms and Karol Lipiński. In 1993, he led the orchestra in a cycle of Tchaikovsky symphonies for the Naxos label, and he has remained associated mostly with that label over his long and prolific recording career. Wit became the conductor of the Warsaw Philharmonic in 2002, remaining there until 2013. He was also the principal guest conductor of the Orquesta Sinfónica de Navarra in Spain from 2010 to 2017, and he made numerous appearances as a guest conductor around Western Europe with such major groups as the Berlin Philharmonic, the Staatskapelle Dresden, the Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Italy, and several top British orchestras.
He has remained active as a guest conductor and recording artist, releasing albums with many of the orchestras with which he has been associated. In 2022, Wit moved to the Capriccio label, leading the Rheinland-Pfalz Staatsphilharmonie in a recording of works by early 20th century composer Zygmunt Stojowski; he followed that up in 2023 with an album of works by 19th century composer Zygmunt Noskowski. By that time, his recording catalog comprised some 300 items, seven of which were nominated for Grammy Awards. Wit taught conducting for many years at the Fryderyk Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw.
© James Manheim /TiVo
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Symphonia domestica
Weimar Staatskapelle, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 28 sep. 2009
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
DVORAK: Hero's Song (A) / Czech Suite / Hussite Overture
Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 19 dec. 1994
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Œuvres pour violoncelle et orchestre
Ivan Monighetti, Arto Noras, Rafał Kwiatkowski, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 28 okt. 2008
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Fonogrammi - Concerto pour cor
Urszula Janik, Elzbieta Stefanska, Jennifer Montone, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 23 mei 2012
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Symphonies Nos. 2 and 4
Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 1 jan. 2000
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Sérénade - Concerto pour violon, op.8
Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, Ilya Kaler, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 4 jan. 2011
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Violin Concertos Nos. 1 and 2
Chee-Yun, Konstanty Andrzej Kulka, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Concertmuziek - Released by Naxos on 18 mrt. 2003
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Schumann : Symphonies n°2 & 4
Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Symfonische muziek - Released by Naxos on 4 jan. 1994
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TCHAIKOVSKY: Symphony No. 3 / The Tempest
Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 27 apr. 1993
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Gorecki: Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs), 3 Olden Style Pieces
Zofia Kilanowicz, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 12 apr. 1994
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
KILAR: Bram Stoker's Dracula / Death and the Maiden
Cracow Philharmonic Chorus, Jacek Mentel, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Marco-Polo on 1 jan. 1992
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Concerto pour piano n°2
Eldar Nebolsin, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 6 okt. 2010
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Piano Concerto in E Major / From Foreign Lands
Markus Pawlik, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 8 jul. 1998
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Concerto pour piano
Henryk Wojnarowski, Waldemar Malicki, Wieslaw Ochman, Warsaw Philharmonic Choir, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 25 jul. 2006
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Chopin : The Complete Works for Piano & Orchestra
Kun-Woo Paik, Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Concerten voor klavier - Released by Decca Music Group Ltd. on 1 jan. 2003
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mahler, G.: Symphony No. 5
Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 15 apr. 1992
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Messiaen : Turangalîla-Symphonie / L'Ascension
Thomas Bloch, Francois Weigel, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 7 sep. 2000
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Prokofiev: Piano Concertos Nos. 1, 3 & 4
Kun-Woo Paik, Antoni Wit, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 25 mrt. 2014
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Ouvertures
Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 6 jan. 2014
24-Bit 88.2 kHz - Stereo -
Gorecki : Symphony No. 2 - Beatus Vir
Andrzej Dobber, Polish Radio Choir, Zofia Kilanowicz, Silesian Philharmonic Choir, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 1 mrt. 2001
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Tchaïkovski : Concertos pour piano n° 1 & 3
Bernd Glemser, Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Antoni Wit
Klassiek - Released by Naxos on 2 aug. 1996
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo