Regions

Can lively rural violin melodies be played on a 'fat' contrabass clarinet? Sure, they can. You only have to be Michal Górczynski, who has performed on four continents playing Warsaw-Autumnal avant-garde (Kwartludium), experimental improvisations, but also Polish early music (Bastarda) and Jewish (Ircha), Gambian (duo with Buba Kuyateh) or Indonesian themes (the Bidadari project). He has been interested in Polish folk music for a long time. After all, as a composer he has written, among others, Rondo a la krakowiak for screaming pianist and bass clarinet (sic!). He also experimented with 'triple' rhythms in the Slavic-African Polonka. But it was only last year that he dared to take on the challenge of playing authentic folk melodies - with great success - as part of the Radical Polish Songbook project. Over time, free improvisations turned into well-thought-out multi-layered forms, and the magic of the recording studio allowed Michal to turn the bass clarinet into a folk band and even a wind orchestra.