© AI Training forbidden - Selected Classical Music in the Poland of Chopin - Reviewer's Notebook

Click on photos to Enlarge London 1934. Edward Cahill seated in the front row on the left of Princess Alice at a private Mayfair piano recital at the home of the Dowager Lady Swaythling                                                  Edward Cahill (1885-1975) at the piano in London at the Queen's Hall 1935 He was featured in the Prologue of my literary travel book on Poland. I have promoted the Polish edition of my book at a number of venues around Poland since I returned from South Africa. In Lodz, Krakow and at the Warsaw International Book Fair. http://www.michael-moran.net/poland.htm http://www.michael-moran.net/pages/polish_editions/Kraj_z_Ksiezyca/index.htm The most remarkable event however was on June 1 at the Chopin ...

Click on Photos to Enlarge Leica D-Lux 4 Children of all colours happily racing on the Strand at Somerset West, Cape Town                       Vineyards near Franschhoek                                                                                                                         On the road towards the village of Greyton                                                                               ...

KRAJ z KSIĘŻYCA. Podróże do serca PolskiWydawnictwo Czarne, Warszawa 2010r. ISBN: 978-83-7536-186-5 Now Available from the author:    mjcmoran@wp.pl    The English edition is called A Country in the Moon : Travels in Search of the Heart of Poland (Granta Books, London 2009) ISBN: 978 1 84708 104 9 http://www.michael-moran.net/poland.htm   (Description in English) This painting on the cover of the Polish Edition above is by the Great War Polish cavalry officer and amateur artist Tomasz Kucharski. This detail from the full painting was used for the cover design. The officers are dancing a mazur. I found his wonderfully naive art forgotten in a gallery at the Teutonic Knights castle of Gniew on the banks of the Vistula. In the castle there was an exhibition of his amateur paintings mainly of cavalry manoeuvres by this Polish cavalry officer from the period of World War I. Tomasz Kucharski had a very distinguished m...

Table setting at the Arts Club Dover Street London W1 for the Eccentric Club Dinner on Wednesday 17th February, 2010 in the presence of HRH The Duke of Edinburgh KG KT A sublime moment of political incorrectness. Gentlemen from the left: HRH Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, Christian Furr, at 28 the youngest artist ever to have painted the Queen, Ian Clarke, one of the finest Chancery barristers, the author Michael Moran laughing in his usual immoderate manner, Jean Francois Dor, a tireless socialite and Chairman or Vice-Chairman of a number of distinguished London Clubs. As you know I was recently elected as a full member to the resuscitated Eccentric Club originally established in 1781 to promote 'The feast of reason and the flow of soul' in an atmosphere of good fellowship. Any discussion of religion, politics or business is frowned upon. What an excellent idea! A small group of us had dinner with HRH Prince Philip (the club's patron) on Fe...

The Old Library, Warsaw University  venue for  Third International Congress CHOPIN 1810-2010 Ideas - Interpretations - Influence [This article also appears in the 84 page Chopin 2010 UK Events Guide] The music of Fryderyk Chopin has always been a haven of spiritual refuge to the Polish nation under oppression be it Tsarist Russia, Nazi Germany, the Soviets or the period of communist hegemony. Yet the accession of Poland to the European Union was curiously low key that cold May night in 2004, at least in the capital Warsaw. Unbridled festivity was not present in an atmosphere filled with long speeches and the ‘Heroic’ polonaise performed by Rafał Blechacz  on a plinth in Piłsudski Square. [1]    The collective memory and final victory of the country over oppression was expressed by a chorus of ghosts without number in Chopin’s passionate and melancholic vision. What then is the emotional significance of Chopin for contemporary Poland...