Programme
For hundreds of years various forms of influence from the west, the east, the north and the south have merged on the territory of Poland. This historical process is
reflected in very rich and diverse culture and art – including music.
The Polish style was flourishing in the times of independence and
becoming a chance and a means of survival when independence was lost
and national identity endangered.
The mixtures of external influences and trends existing side by
side with typical Polish elements is both enigmatic and artistically
challenging. Because of constant wars and invasions very little is left
of old beliefs, myths and ceremonies.
Folk tradition – the source of the oldest Polish musical idioms –
was passed from generation to generation in the process of oral
tradition and not much is left today of old beliefs, customs and
rituals. That is why, although it offers us a wonderful glimpse into
the past, it cannot be regarded as a reliable source of historical
information. First explorations of Polish folklore dated back to the
beginning of the 19th century. Some very general information concerning
Polish folk music and instruments can be found in literature since the
time of Mikołaj Rej. When the sources are so limited, a lot has to
remain unknown.
Music has always been an indispensable form of entertainment at
peasants festivities, gatherings in marketplaces or village inns and
wedding feasts at royal courts. On these occasions folk and court
traditions interwove. However, since the 16th century the distance
between folk music on one hand and so-called art music, on the other
has become more and more evident, the first one being anonymous and
spontaneous and the other one based on theoretical assumptions and
created by professional composers.
As we know from historical sources it was about that time that the
Polish style in music emerged. It can be best seen in so called Polish
dances – choreae polonicae, which gained enormous popularity in the 17th c. Europe.
The 16th and especially 17th century lute and organ tabulatures include
a lot of such dances both in two beat and three beat time as a
combination of two metrically contrasting parts. Their names usually
described the way they were danced or the customs they referred to. We
have been most interested in the dances whose titles and rhythms
(goniony „the run”, wyrwany „the struggle”) referred to folk tradition
or whose music imitates the sound of folk instruments such as a
bagpipe.
Our intention was to present the emergence of folk archetypes with
artistic creation in the course of history. While preparing this record
we tried to look back into the past in order to find our
strength-giving roots and to experience what is impossible to describe,
and what we call „the Polish archetype in music”, that is the ele¬ment
that makes this music so unmistakably Polish and therefore unique. Our
repertoire is the result of searching through historical descriptions,
published works and field recordings as well as of travelling all over
the country. Some tunes come from 19th c. folksong collection by Oscar
Kolberg and others have been taken from contemporary documentation of
the Institute of Art of the Polish Academy of Sciences. In order to
achieve our aims we chose melodies either referring to pre-Christian
customs (e.g. „Hej św. Jónie”, „Gdybyś się chciał biały Janie ożenić”, „Oj chmielu”) or attractive due to their archaic sound being a result of narrow-range scales (e.g. „Melodia
do wicia rózgi”, „Rosła ja se rosła”, „Na dobranoc radomskie”, „Na
dobranoc przed ślubem”, „Dziewcyna z Nowogroda”, „Kośniki”).
Rhythm is an expression of vitality. What is considered the most
important Polish element in music is the rhythm of mazurkas. It is
clearly present in such typical folk dances as mazurek, oberek and kujawiak,
without which a traditional Polish wedding is hard to imagine. What is
however, especially noteworthy is the fact that dance tunes of the
mazurka type often bring folk musicians to the quasi trance. In our
repertoire this group is represented by „Oberek kajocki” which
was composed by the late Józef Kędzierski from Rdzuchow (from Andrzej
Bieńkowski's field recordings). The phenomenon of going into a trance
while playing is present in many musical cultures but few people know
that trance music exists also in Poland. „Oberek kajocki” is based on
improvisation and as such results from spontaneous creation, which is
the most original and true in music.
We also recorded some „polkas”. Although this dance is not of
Polish origin, it has been popular in our country for so long that it
has become an integral part of the image of our folk practice.
Polish folk dance tunes intermingle with Polish dances choreae polonicae
from lute tabulatures of Jan Stobeus, Jan Długoraj and Piotr Fabricius.
Using similar performance manners arrangements we tried to point at
analogies rather than differences between this two groups of the
repertoire. The sorrowful ballad „Służył Jasio u Pana” with
changing metres and modal tonality represents the old strata of vocal
music, here arranged for voice and instruments. Although our music
comes from authentic sources, we do not intend to just reconstruct
performance tradition of the past, but also taking into account
expectations of the today's listener we try to find new and attractive
ways of presenting the world of forgotten music. The whole image of our
group results not only from our repertoire and its special
interpretation but also from the use of archaic instruments. Unique
copies of Polish historical instruments which vanished before centuries
– the suka from Biłgoraj, the fiddle from Płock (both instruments are
played with very rare in Europe technique of playing so-called
finger-nail technique; the fiddle from Płock is the only copy of an
instrument from 16th c. excavated in 1985 in Płock; the suka from
Biłgoraj is a reconstruction based on 19th c. iconographical sources)
as well
as a typical rural hollow violin and a hollow bass, were made by the
excellent luthier from Warsaw Andrzej Kuczkowski. Apart from stringed
instruments we also play other instruments deeply rooted in our folk
music practice: the dulcimer, the pipes, the bagpipe and the drums.
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Offering you this CD I believe that the more profound
knowledge of our musical heritage of our tradition of today will make
it easier for us to understand others and to be understood by them.
Maria Pomianowska