January 2019, Manchester Weinberg Conference

It may have been six months ago, but minds are still reeling from the amazing 'Weinberg: East and West' conference at the University of Manchester at the start of this year. Michelle Assay and David Fanning organised a fantastic four-day event, including concerts and a complete Quartet Cycle performed by the fantastic Quatuor Danel.

Egbert Baars, of the DSCH journal, attended and has uploaded an excellent gallery of photos from the conference. I've included a selection of photos below (reproduced here with permission):

From my workshop with the Quatuor Danel on the original version of Weinberg's First Quartet. 

Gidon Kremer, who paid us an extraordinary 'flying' visit, stopping by with enough time to perform and give a moving talk. 

The ensemble from one of the afternoon concerts (L-R): Marc Danel, Michelle Assay, Rosalind Dobson 

A video conference call with Victoria Bishops, Weinberg's first daughter. 

Conference delegates enjoying a meal before an evening concert. 

Truly exceptional, the Quatuor Danel: Marc Danel, Gilles Millet, Vlad Bogdanas, and Yovan Markovitch.

Performers and scholars. back row L-R: Larissa Zvereva, Vlad Bogdanas, Yovan Markovitch, and David Fanning; front row L-R: Inessa Dvuzhilnaya, Gilles Millet, Michelle Assay, Marc Danel, and Verena Mogl.

Conference sessions: Antonina Klokova and Verena Mogl.

Aleksander Laskowski.

Michelle Assay and David Fanning.

Group photo of performers, scholars, and general public.

For more of Egbert's photos, you can visit his website at: https://www.shostakovich.nl/manchester_2019/manchester_2019.html. 

University of Manchester Weinberg conference

Weinberg 100: 2

One of the first major centenary celebrations of 2019 takes place 24-27 January at the University of Manchester, UK. This is an academic conference, running alongside a series of concerts (including a complete Quartet cycle performed by the University's quartet-in-residence, the Quatuor Danel).

The programme includes a veritable who's-who of Weinberg experts, including his family and friends. I've pasted the full programme below; full details (including booking) can be found here.

Thursday 24 January 
1.10 Quatuor Danel concert (buffet lunch available before and after)

2.15 Opening of Weinberg Exhibition, in association with The Polish Cultural Institute, Manchester and the Adam Mickiewicz Institute, Warsaw

2.30 Quatuor Danel with Dr Daniel Elphick (Royal Holloway, London). Workshop on reconstructing the original version of Weinberg’s String Quartet No. 1.

3.15 Open session on ‘Weinberg and Performance’

4.00 coffee break

4.30 David Fanning and Michelle Assay: ‘Weinberg research: Present and Future’

5.30 dinner

7.30 Quatuor Danel concert

Friday 25 January
9.30 Verena Mogl (University of Hamburg) ‘Weinberg’s early years’, Antonina Klokova (Humboldt-University, Berlin) ‘title tbc’, Aleksander Laskowski (Adam Mickiewicz Institute, Warsaw) ‘ Weinberg and Tuwim’

11.00 coffee break

11.30 Inessa Dvuzhilnaya (Grodno, Belarus) ‘Weinberg in Minsk’, Christoph Flamm (Musikhochschule Lübeck) ‘Weinberg’s piano-chamber music’.

1.00 Quatuor Danel concert (buffet lunch available before and after)

2.30 Nicky Gluch ‘Shamor V’zachor: Observing and Remembering Mieczysław Weinberg’; Yelena Prokhorova (‘European Cultural Initiative’ named after M. Weinberg, Berlin) ‘The violin and its a musical-theatrical role in the artistic work of Weinberg’, Virginie Constant (Paris) ‘Weinberg’s works for cello’

4.00 coffee break

4.30 Concert: Songs by Weinberg and Shostakovich (Rosalind Dobson and Michelle Assay)

5.30 dinner

7.30 Quatuor Danel concert

Saturday 26 January
9.30 Bret Werb (Holocaust Museum, Washington DC) ‘Weinberg in Washington’, Levon Hakobian (State Arts Research Institute, Moscow) ‘Weinberg as a Bronze Age Figure’, Stefan Weiss (Musikhochschule, Hannover) ‘“And music made tongue-tied by prosody ...”: Mieczysław Weinberg’s Opus 33 in the history of Russian settings of Shakespeare’s sonnets’

11.00 coffee break

11.30 Daniel Elphick (Royal Holloway, London) ‘Weinberg and Polish-Russian relations’, Agnieska Nowok-Zych (Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music, Katowice, Poland) ‘Three life stories – one joint truth. Weinberg, Tuwim, Broniewski: inspirations and parallels’.

1.00 Quatuor Danel concert (buffet lunch before or after)

2.30 Dmitry Abaulin (Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theatre, Moscow), ‘Weinberg at the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theatre’, Tommy Persson (Gothenburg) ‘Weinberg’s last years’

4.00 coffee break

4.30 Concert: Weinberg Sonata for Double bass solo (Robert Carrillo Garcia) and Piano Sonata No. 6 (Michelle Assay)

5.45–7.15 dinner

7.30 Quatuor Danel concert

Sunday 27 January
10.00 interview with Victoria Bishops: ‘Letters from my father’

11.00 coffee break

11.30 round-table discussion

12.15 buffet lunch

1.00 Quatuor Danel concert (including Piano Quintet with David Fanning)

3.30 end of event