The orchestra said on its website that the work, written in Poland in the darkest days of World War II, is "a life-affirming shout of defiance, from a composer who was never afraid to make herself heard (and deserves to be played more often)."
The concert, with Finnish conductor Saraki Oramo directing the orchestra, also includes works by Mozart, Elgar and Dvorák.
On February 10, the BBC Symphony Orchestra under the same conductor will perform Bacewicz’s Fourth Symphony and Karol Szymanowski’s Third Symphony: Song of the Night.
Szymanowski was one of Poland's most prominent 20th-century classical music composers.
The orchestra’s website writes that “Bacewicz’s Fourth Symphony is like a bolt of electricity: energetic, atmospheric, and utterly original. It’s a gripping contrast to the fragrant ecstasies of Szymanowski’s Song of the Night, a symphony like no other from a composer who worshipped sensuality and sunlight. For Sakari Oramo, though, these two great Polish symphonies are natural companions – and both make an unforgettable impression."
A selection of Bacewicz’s works for chamber orchestra recorded for Poland’s DUX label by Polish Radio’s Amadeus Orchestra is in the running for the 2023 BBC Music Magazine Award in the Orchestral category.
Born in 1909 into a Polish-Lithuanian family, Bacewicz started her education at the Music Conservatory in Łódź at the age of 10 and continued at the Warsaw Conservatory, studying both composition and violin.
She graduated in 1932. Thanks to a grant from the École Normale de Musique in Paris, she continued her studies there, with Nadia Boulanger (composition) and André Touret and Carl Flesch (violin).
Her career as a violinist developed in a spectacular way. In 1935, she received an honourable mention at the 1st Henryk Wieniawski International Violin Competition. In later years, she served as leader of the Polish Radio Orchestra in Warsaw and pursued an intensive concert career in Poland and abroad.
After the war, she continued her solo career, with recitals in many European countries. From 1955 onward she devoted herself solely to composition.
Bacewicz died in 1969. Her output includes seven violin concertos, two cello concertos, one viola concerto, seven string quartets, four symphonies, one opera, a ballet, five sonatas for violin and piano, two sonatas for solo violin and numerous other chamber pieces.
(mk/gs)