Nobody expected this! As many as TWO ICMA prizes awarded to the Poznań Philharmonic Orchestra for the album “Urlicht. Songs of Death and Resurrection” are on their way from Düsseldorf to Poznań.

When this year’s winners of one of the most prestigious phonographic prizes in the world, the International Classical Music Award (ICMA), were announced in January, we were immensely glad to learn that the album “Urlicht. Songs of Death and Resurrection” recorded by the Poznań Philharmonic Orchestra under Łukasz Borowicz with the baritone Samuel Hasselhorn and the boys’ voices of The Poznań Nightingales, the Boys and Men’s Choir of the Poznań Philharmonic, received the distinction in the Vocal Music category.

Only today, on 19 March, during the prize-giving ceremony held at the Tonhalle in Düsseldorf, did we learn that the special Recording of the Year prize also went to the Poznań Philharmonic Orchestra for the album “Urlicht. Songs of Death and Resurrection”.

Wojciech Nentwig, Director of the Poznań Philharmonic, Łukasz Borowicz, principal conductor of the Poznań Philharmonic Orchestra and Music Director of the Poznań Philharmonic, Samuel Hasselhorn, baritone, and Jean-Marc Berns who represented Harmonia Mundi label, were visibly surprised, though no less satisfied when collecting the 2025 ICMA for the album “Urlicht. Songs of Death and Resurrection”.

Not only is the Poznań Philharmonic Orchestra the sole Polish ensemble to have won two ICMA statuettes (the first was awarded for the 2018 album “Quo vadis” by Feliks Nowowiejski), but also one to have garnered the prize simultaneously in two different categories.

Published last year by Harmonia Mundi, the album “Urlicht” features songs and arias by Gustav Mahler, Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Alexander von Zemlinsky, Hans Pfitzner, Engelbert Humperdinck, Alban Berg and Walter Braunfels. In the verdict, the ICMA jury stated: This is a remarkable CD, not only because of Samuel Hasselhorn’s outstanding singing, grippingly dramatic and movingly sensitive throughout the programme, but also because of the conductor Łukasz Borowicz and the highly evocative “sound theatre” he gets from the Poznań Philharmonic Orchestra. The symbiosis of voice and orchestra is just perfect.

The Gala Concert, which added splendour to ICMA 2025 award-presenting ceremony at the Tonhalle in Düsseldorf, featured prize-winners perform with the Düsseldorfer Symphoniker (itself winner of the 2025 ICMA in the Special Achievement category) conducted, among others, by Adam Fischer (the ensemble’s Music Director) and Vitali Alekseenok (Music Director of Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Düsseldorf). One of the pieces delivered on the night was the song “Revelge” by Gustav Mahler performed by Samuel Hasselhorn with the Düsseldorfer Symphoniker under Łukasz Borowicz.