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This weekend, the Art Festival of the Mińsk County will come to Mrozy. The sixth event of the Festival will be held at the Municipal Cultural Centre on 17 October 2021 at 6.00 p.m. The "Czas Sztuki" Foundation invites you to a concert dedicated to Fryderyk Chopin on the 172nd anniversary of the composer's death.

We will hear Chopin's masterpieces performed by renowned pianist Mischa Kozłowski – a graduate of Hochschule der Künste Bern in Switzerland, and currently lecturer at the Chamber Music Department of the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw and president of the "Partnership in Music" Foundation. The artist, who performs all over the world, has won many awards at national and international music competitions, including the 9th International Chopin Piano Competition in Darmstadt and the Polish Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw, organised by the Fryderyk Chopin Institute.

The Mińsk County's Art Festival features 13 artistic events in each of the thirteen municipalities of the Mińsk County. The festival combines many fields of art: classical music concerts, educational music workshops for seniors and children, as well as music and poetry meetings commemorating outstanding Polish poets and their work. The concerts will feature excellent artists: Mateusz Szemraj, Adeb Chamoun, Olga Bończyk, Mischa Kozłowski, Agata Barwinek-Bembinow, Tango Fuerte, Reed Connection, Maciej Bator, Katarzyna Wiwer, Maksymilian Grzesiak, Katarzyna Boniecka, Rafał Łuc, The Time Quartet.

Co-financed by the budget of the Minsk Poviat and the Mazowieckie Voivodeship. Sponsored by the PZU Foundation.

Media patronage: Polish Music Information Centre POLMIC.

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Although the programme of the NFM Leopoldinum Orchestra’s concert on 16 October 2021 at 6 p.m. with Alexander Sitkovetsky includes works by two British and one Polish composers, all these pieces were written in England. They are also linked by the authors’ liking for displaying beautiful, singing melodies.

At the beginning of the concert, the musicians will present the Saint Paul Suite, Op. 29 No. 2 by Gustav Holst, which consists of four movements: Jig, Ostinato, Intermezzo and Finale (The Dargason). The title tune of the last movement, The Dargason, is a folk dance that was included in The English Dancing Master, published by John Playford in 1651. This part of the Suite also includes a quote from another popular old English melody – Greensleeves.

The Violin Concerto by Andrzej Panufnik, commissioned by his friend Yehudi Menuhin, is completely different. The composer accepted the offer with joy, and for him writing the piece was a return to the world of his childhood. The artist’s father was a violin maker, and the future composer’s youth was filled with the smells of wood and varnish, as well as the sight of instruments created in the workshop. These experiences influenced the reflective, warm and lyrical tone of the piece. They also made the composer living in England decide to write the third movement in the rhythm of a joyful oberek. Panufnik wrote: ‘I composed a piece that was to show the soul of the performer rather than turn the fretboard into a gymnasium for jumping fingers.’

The evening will end with Britten’s Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge, Op. 10. They were commissioned by the conductor Louis Boyd Neel, who premiered them with his orchestra that same year at the Salzburg Festival. This concert was the beginning of the British composer’s spectacular career.

The project is part of the commemoration of the centennial of regaining independence and rebuilding Polish statehood.

Media patronage: Polish Music Information Centre POLMIC.

More information: https://www.nfm.wroclaw.pl/en/

The Jerzy Semkow Polish Sinfonia Iuventus Orchestra will perform on 16 October 2021 at 7 p.m. at the Witold Lutosławski Concert Studio of Polish Radio in Warsaw under the baton of Mirosław Jacek Błaszczyk, a member of the orchestra's Arts Council. We will hear works by Giuseppe Verdi, Saverio Mercadante and Piotr Tchaikovsky. The concert is co-organised by the National Institute of Music and Dance within the framework of the "Conductor-in-residence" programme.

The Italian Saverio Mercadante, of a generation close to Rossini, was a prominent opera creator in his time. His rich oeuvre remains largely forgotten today, with the exception of the work of the only eighteen-year-old composer – Flute Concerto No. 2 in E minor, loved especially for the final Rondo russo, one of the great hits of classical music, eagerly performed by flutists as an encore. During the October concert, the work will be performed by Łukasz Długosz, one of the most versatile and highly-regarded flutists of his generation.

The Italian part of the programme also includes the overture to the opera The Force of Destiny by Giuseppe Verdi, pulsating with emotions, full of beautiful melodies. What does this work have in common with Tchaikovsky's latest symphony? Both works premiered in St. Petersburg (Verdi's opera in 1862).

Due to its expressive aura, Pyotr Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6, probably as no other symphony in the history of music, deserved the name "Tragique", as Modest Tchaikovsky, the composer’s brother and confidant, suggested. Pyotr, however, preferred his second suggestion and right after the premiere, he added the subtitle "Pathetique", suggested by his brother, to the score. The composer died nine days after the premiere of the piece, most probably due to an acute cholera attack. He did not leave any programme or commentary to the symphony. All we can do is guess and, primarily, delight upon the piece characterised by great expression, the piece that is Romantic to the bone, filled with exaltation and unconventional elements.

Anna Sułkowska-Migoń, appointed resident conductor of the Polish Sinfonia Iuventus Orchestra in the 2021/2022 season, participated in the preparation of the concert.

Media patronage: Polish Music Information Centre POLMIC.

More information: https://sinfoniaiuventus.pl/en/

The Open Theatre in Gdańsk, which celebrates its 25th anniversary in 2021, invites to the premiere of The Turbulent History of the Polish Army on the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the Order of Polonia Restituta. The music and theatre performance will take place at the Artus Court in Gdańsk on 16 October at 6.00 p.m. under the National Patronage of the President of the Republic of Poland, Mr. Andrzej Duda.

The founder and artistic director of the Open Theatre is Dariusz S. Wójcik – a well-known Gdańsk singer, winner of the provincial eliminations of the "Personality of the Year 2020" Plebiscite and the 3rd place in the "Personality of the Year in Poland 2020" in the "culture" category. Dariusz Wójcik is the author of the script and the director of the performance which is dedicated to the Fathers of Polish Independence: Józef Piłsudski, Roman Dmowski, Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Wincenty Witos, Wojciech Korfanty, Ignacy Daszyński, who were awarded the Order of Polonia Restituta and the Order of the White Eagle.

The programme will include patriotic songs that were written in various periods of the struggle for independence and after Poland regained its independence. Works by Wojciech (Albert) Sowiński, Michał Kleofas Ogiński, Kazimierz Hofman, Karol Kurpiński, Władysław Tarnowski, Mieczysław Kozar-Słobódzki, Władysław Piątkiewicz, Adam Kowalski, Alfred Schutz, Witold Rowicki, Andrzej Panufnik, and Albert Harris will be performed in new arrangements by Kamil Cieślik, teacher at the Stanisław Moniuszko Academy of Music in Gdańsk, vice-dean of the Faculty of Conducting, Composition and Music Theory.

Among the performers will be Małgorzata Trojanowska (soprano), Jacek Szymański (tenor), Dariusz S. Wójcik (bass), Rafał Lewandowski (piano), Mea Patria Chamber Ensemble and Male Vocal Ensemble. An integral part of the show will be a historical commentary by an employee of the National Education Office of the Institute of National Remembrance in Gdańsk, as well as beautiful choreographic arrangements presenting Polish national dances performed by dancers of the "Jantar" Song and Dance Ensemble of the University of Gdańsk.

Admission is free, but tickets must be pre-booked at: +48 600 290 214.

Co-financed by the NIEPODLEGŁA Multiannual Programme for 2017-2022 under the "Niepodległa" Subsidy Programme.

Co-financed by the City of Gdańsk.

Patronage: Franciszek Stefczyk Foundation and Argo S.A.

Media patronage: Polish Music Information Centre POLMIC.

More information: www.teatrotwarty.pl