2015-06-17

Today, on June 17th, Romuald Twardowski celebrates 85th birthday. On this occasion we asked him several common and uncommon questions.

The first musical memory...
Pre-war time, the post-bernardine church in Vilnius. THE ORGAN!

My first composition...
Prelude in F major for organ, based on the Polish carol Lulajże Jezuniu (Sleep My Child). Composed at St. John's organ on 11 November 1947.

I'm inspired by...
Poetry, literature, travelling, nature.

The greatest composing challenge...
Creating my own, separate style, based on the synthesis of the New and the Old.

My listeners...
…are people with serious and not "festival” attitude to music. I'm thinking here of the so-called "philharmonic" audience which is "formed" and competent. Berlin, London and Moscow have such audiences…

Tradition or avant-guard?
One does not preclude the other. The future and the present originate from the past.

I usually listen to...
...less and less music. I hardly listen to my own music. I sometimes recall this and that from Stravinsky, Ravel, Bach or Vivaldi. But I usually hum church songs...

If I were not a composer...
...I would become a painter. I have a critical eye, an inborn sense of aesthetics.

I was influenced by...
Stravinsky and Lutosławski.

I would never decide to...
...be a film music composer.

I cannot imagine living without...
...music. Despite all!

I do not like...
Mondays and all kinds of braggarts, ninnies or lunar aesthetes.

I willingly come back to...
Vilnius, the city of my youth.

Food without which I cannot live...
Lithuanian kuldunai!

In my free time...
I read and go for a walk.