Jan A.P. Kaczmarek's 'Jankiel Concerto' set for premiere

Entitled Jankiel’s Concerto, the piece refers to one of the work’s characters, a Jewish inn-keeper Jankiel, the master of the dulcimer.

In Book XII of Pan Tadeusz, Jankiel plays a medley of Polish patriotic tunes which opens with a joyous polonaise in praise of the Constitution of the Third of May 1791 and ends with the Dąbrowski Mazurka (Poland is not yet lost), a song praising General Henryk Dąbrowski, which later became Poland’s national anthem.

Kaczmarek’s piece will have its world premiere on Sunday, 3 July, at the National Philharmonic Hall in Warsaw, performed by Sinfonia Varsovia under its Music Director Marc Minkowski and soloists from the Wasilinki dulcimer ensemble from the Belarussian National Academy of Music.

Jankiel’s Concerto was commissioned by the Adam Mickiewicz Institute.

The story of Pan Tadeusz, recognised as Poland’s national epic, takes place over the course of five days in 1811 and one day in 1812, when the Commonwealth of Poland and Lithuania had already been divided between Russia, Prussia and Austria.

The programme of Sunday’s concert also includes Beethoven’s ‘Eroica’ Symphony and the overture to the opera Two Cottages (Dwie Chatki) by the Polish composer Karol Kurpiński (1785-1857). (mk)