Idea 2022

Welcome to the All Mazurkas of the World festival!

The All Mazurkas of the World Festival did not take place this year in April, as it usually did, because when in Ukraine missiles are exploding and people are dying, it was difficult to organize this joyful holiday. In the end, however, we recognized that songs, music and traditional dance are synonyms of community and identity, which also in the wartime conditions, give a sense of meaning and the power to resist aggression. We decided to invite Ukrainian artists to cooperation to create an event being a space for the presentation and encounter of Polish and Ukrainian cultures as well as spiritual support in the fight for victory. We will sing songs of peace and victory together.

We are organizing the spring festival for the thirteenth time. It consists of specially prepared concerts and activities arranged in long-term processes, aiming at the transmission of specific skills and the “spirit” of traditional music. Workshops – singing, dancing and instrumental music – are particularly important in this process, thanks to which a growing number of people use the musical and dance language (or languages) as an expression of their own expression.

The contest for young performers the Old Tradition traditionally opens the festival. Every year we look forward to young bands, bands of singers and soloists. It is wonderful that we are receiving more and more new applications from all regions of Poland. The winners of the Old Tradition – after 12 editions we have over 140 – participate later in the musical life of their communities and co-create a new quality in Polish music. We are very happy with this young generation, we believe that they will go through their lives by music, singing, dancing and passing on their musical passions.

We initiated the series of concerts “restoring memory” to create space for traditional music from regions where in a living tradition it can no longer be found. Thanks to archival sources and music work it is possible to reconstruct it in an interesting form. This year, the choice falls on Northern Masovia. Back in the 1990s, it was musically unknown land, new fashions displaced old notes and dances. We will try to tell stories about this world, which includes wedding and paternal songs and dances, including small noble contro. There are many such “unknown lands” in Poland, perhaps our concert will be an inspiration for further research and experiments.

Holy Night brings a physical experience of solstice. This is a theme of songs and rites from pagan times. Many of these have survived in Ukraine. The Summer Songs Concert flies this evening will hopefully be a unique experience. Songs from Ukraine – regionally diverse – and from Poland will be heard by legendary singers and singers, including bands Drewo, Babskyj Kozaczok, Krajka, Dziczka and Maria Siwiec.

The code of the festival will be the Sunday concert of Songs of War – Songs of Victory. War was, unfortunately, a common experience in Ukraine and Poland for generations. From recruiting songs, through songs of suffering and longing to victorious songs – all this will sound in the concert. We hope to be able to invite – among other great performers – the famous bandurists and cobblers Taras Kompanichenko and Jarosław Kyśko together with their legendary band Chorea Kozacka. It is difficult, but not impossible, under conditions of war.

The Mazurkas climax is Saturday’s Instruments Fair with presentations, meetings, workshops led by instrument makers and Little Mazurkas aimed at children. Finally, the crazy Dance Night, during which at least 25 of the best bands – rural and urban, master and student – from different regions of Poland and from abroad will play for the dance until the white morning. Taking advantage of the advantages of the new, welcoming place – the Culture Terminal (Terminal Kultury) – we decided to extend this already proven formula by another afternoon and we invite you also on Sunday.

This year the dates of the festival All Mazurkas of the World coincide in part with the dates of the Festival of Folk Singers and Bands in Kazimierz. This is an unfortunate coincidence. We hope that the winners of the previous edition of the festival in Kazimierz will sing and play with a desire to dance at the Mazurkas, musicians and their students, who form the community of our festival, will perform with success on the competition stage of the Kazimierz market, and lovers of traditional music will be able – traveling – to combine the values of both festivals.

We would like to thank all our Partners and Patrons, especially the hosting of the festival on their dance floors Centrum Promocji Kultury Praga Południe (Center for Culture Promotion Praga Południe) and Terminal Kultury (Culture Terminal).

We dance the dances of peace in the belief that the songs of war will be silent and the songs of victory will sound with great power.

Artistic Director of the Festival
Janusz Prusinowski