About Warsaw Music Encounters
The Warsaw Music Encounters have been organized since 1986 by the Warsaw Branch of the Polish Composers’ Union. It is the only festival focused on the work of composers active in Warsaw. Its characteristic feature is the presentation of unknown works of early music. Such a combination of historical and contemporary music sometimes creates surprising contexts, inspiring the creation of new works using the languages of different eras. At the same time, the festival avoids presenting works of the Classicism and Romanticism epochs, unless they are forgotten or recently discovered worth getting to know. Thanks to this, an alternative to the „mainstream” repertoire presented daily in philharmonics and radio stations is created, and at the same time is an important supplement to it.
Festival Program Board
JAROSŁAW SIWIŃSKI – Artistic Director
Pianist, composer, organizer of music and educational events. He studied piano and composition at the Academy of Music in Warsaw (now FCUM). As a result of financial cuts in education, he practiced instrumentation virtually at that time, creating, among others, the musical setting for the computer game Grom by Rebelmind. He also wrote music for theater plays and animated films. He collaborated, among others with Michelangelo Pistoletto, Eugeniusz Rudnik, the Viktor Lois/Yin Peet Duo and the Azorro Group. He composed for such ensembles as the Wilanów Quartet, Orkiestra Muzyki Nowej, De Ereprijs ensemble, Bang on a Can or Forbidden City Chamber Orchestra. For many years he cooperated with the Children’s Art Center in Poznań. He was a scholarship holder of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, Capital City of Warsaw and the ZAiKS Authors’ Association. He is also active in the Polish Society of Contemporary Music.
WŁADYSŁAW SŁOWIŃSKI – Honorary Director
Composer, conductor, and organizer of musical events. Founder and for many years artistic director, nowadays honorary director of the Warsaw Music Encounters.
In 1949-51 he studied musicology with Adolf Chybiński in Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań; in 1950-54 – composition with Tadeusz Szeligowski and in 1951-55 conducting with Walerian Bierdiajew and Stanisław Wisłocki in the State Higher School of Music in Poznań. As a conductor, he collaborated with many symphony orchestras in Poland. In 1970-73 he was the artistic director of the Polskie Nagrania. In 1973-1985 he was the Secretary-General of the Polish Composers’ Union (PCU) and 1985-2001 – President of PCU Warsaw Branch. For his works and activity, Władysław Słowiński received numerous awards and distinctions.
He reconstructed and developed missing The Old Tale operas by Wladyslaw Żeleński score (1959).
ARTUR CIEŚLAK was born in 1968 in Szczecin. Composer and pianist. He studied at the Academy of Music in Warsaw (1987-92, piano, prof. Regina Smendzianka and prof. Jerzy Romaniuk; 2006-2008, postgraduate studies in composition, prof. Marian Borkowski) and at the I. J. Paderewski in Poznań (1998-2003, composition, prof. Jan Astriab).
In 2012 he obtained a doctoral degree in composition (the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw).
Important compositions: Reminiscencja for saxophone and piano (2002); Understatements for cello and piano (2006); Piano Concerto for left hand and symphony orchestra (2009); Piano Sonata No. 1 „Post-Neo” for the left hand (2013); Cellophony for cello (2014); Symphony of Space for orchestra (2016); Trio for clarinet, cello, and piano (2018); Niepodległa – oratorio (2018).
SŁAWOMIR CZARNECKI studied at the Warsaw Music Academy in 1969-74 with Piotr Perkowski and Romuald Twardowski. In 1980-81 he completed supplementary studies with Olivier Messiaen in Paris as a scholarship holder of the French government.
Currently, he is a professor at the Kazimierz Wielki University in Bydgoszcz. For many years, he has also been associated with the J. Elsner School of Music in Warsaw, conducting classes teaching composition.
He is a laureate of 17 composition competitions in Poland and abroad. For his pedagogical work and creativity, he was awarded the Medal of the National Education Commission and the Silver Gloria Artis Medal, as well as the presidential Gold Medal „For many years of service” and the Gold Cross of Merit.
His work currently includes 63 opuses, including solo, chamber, symphonic, choral, and cantata pieces.
PAWEŁ GANCARCZYK is the head of the Department of Musicology at the Institute of Art of the Polish Academy of Sciences, editor-in-chief of the quarterly „Muzyka”, vice-chairman of the Committee of Art Sciences of the Polish Academy of Sciences. In 2020, he was elected a member of the European Academia Europaea and the Warsaw Scientific Society.
Author of numerous works on the history of medieval and early modern music; published, among others, the book La musique et la révolution de l’imprimerie (Lyon 2015, awarded the Prix des Muses 2016). He takes part in many international initiatives and projects, incl. as part of the Humanities in the European Research Area (HERA) program. In the years 2011–2015, he was the president of the Musicologists Section of the Polish Composers’ Union.
ANNA IGNATOWICZ-GLIŃSKA, DSc of composition, a graduate of the Fryderyk Chopin Academy of Music (now FCUM), in the class of prof. Kotoński, doctorate with prof. St. Moryto. She studied piano improvisation with prof. d.h.c. Sz. Esztényi. She is an assistant professor at her alma mater. Her output includes works for various performances. Her compositions are presented at concerts and festivals, recorded for albums, and published in print, both in Poland and abroad. She combines composing activity with scientific, didactic, and organizational activity. She performs various functions at the University, in the structures of the Polish Composers’ Union, in the Warsaw Music Encounters’ Council, and the ZAiKS Authors’ Association.
She writes articles for the music press, also small literary forms and she gardens by the house she lives in.
JAN OLESZKOWICZ, composer and teacher, born September 30, 1947 in Jelenia Góra.
In 1971 he graduated with honors from composition studies at the State Higher School of Music in Warsaw under Grażyna Bacewicz and Andrzej Dobrowolski. In 1980 he obtained a diploma from the Paris Conservatory in composition in the class of Olivier Messiaen and Guy Reibel.
In 1996 he received the Silver Cross of Merit from the President of the Republic of Poland for his educational achievements. In 2017 he received a postdoctoral degree at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw.
He has composed nearly 90 works. He is a laureate of 16 composition competitions and the author of 3 book publications.
EDWARD SIELICKI was born in 1956 in Warsaw. He studied composition with Andrzej Dobrowolski and Włodzimierz Kotoński at the Academy of Music in Warsaw, Ton de Leeuw at the Sweelinck Conservatorium in Amsterdam and also with Chou Wen Chung, Elliot Carter and Witold Lutosławski.
He is a laureate of composers’ awards in Poland and Switzerland and the Wyspianski’s Award. Many of his more than 160 compositions have been performed in France, Belgium, the Netherlands and the UK, USA, Mexico, Canada, Russia, Italy and South Korea. He received many orders, incl. from the „Warsaw Autumn” Festival, Polish Radio, Ministry of Culture and many orchestras, chamber ensembles and soloists.
Currently, he is an assistant professor at the FCUM in Warsaw. He was visiting professor at Keimyung-Chopin Academy of Music in Daegu (South Korea).
ADAM SŁAWIŃSKI was born in 1935. He studied musicology at the University of Warsaw.
In the years 1957-63 he worked as a music editor at the Polish Television. In 1990-91 he was the director of Polish Radio Programme II. Here he introduced, among others, live broadcasts from the Metropolitan Opera, a regular programme on electro-acoustic music and the first live broadcast of the entire Chopin Competition.
He received, among others, the award of the President of Polish Radio and Television, the Minister of Culture and Art, the Jazz Forum magazine award „Man of the Year” and the award of the Polish Composers’ Union for creative achievements and multi-faceted activity for the composing community.
He wrote his first compositions in 1962, for the Television Theatre. Author of music for a series of TV programs by Agnieszka Osiecka, an outstanding song writer, Singing letters, to about 40 films and series. Since beginning of the 1970s, he compose also works pereformed at new music festivals and concerts.
MACIEJ ZIELIŃSKI is a Warsaw composer, born in 1971. His professional greed means that he deals not only with contemporary music, but also film and entertainment music.
He is a graduate of the F. Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw and the Royal Academy of Music in London. He is known as the composer of music for many famous films and songs. His works have received numerous composition awards and have been performed at many festivals in Poland and around the world, including the Warsaw Autumn and ISCM World Music Days.
So far, over 30 albums with his music have been published, including 3 monographic ones. In 2011 he was nominated for the „Fryderyk” award in the „Composer of the Year” category. His film music has been nominated and awarded many times in Poland, the USA and Croatia.
ARTUR ŻUCHOWSKI, composer, conductor and musician. He graduated from the organ class at the Salesian General Secondary Music School of pr. A. Chlondowski in Lutomiersk, the G. and K. Bacewicz Academy of Music in Łódź (composition), Postgraduate Studies in Composition at the FCUM in Warsaw, Postgraduate Studies in Educational Management at KPSW in Bydgoszcz.
From 2019, a doctor of art in the artistic discipline of musical arts.
In the years 2012-14, a member of the board of the Youth Circle of the Polish Composers’ Union, from 2017 a member of the board of the Warsaw Branch of the Polish Composers’ Union, from 2019 the secretary of the board.
In 2014-15, he was an activist for the creating of the First Level Music School in Przasnysz and until now its first director.
