ETNOKRAKOW/ CROSSROADS 2024

EtnoKraków // Crossroads/Rozstaje 2024

Wandering. The Myth of Beginnings. The Myth of Apocalypse.

Prologue to the Festival: Concert at the Break of Dawn, part of Kraków’s Wianki; workshops and a concert by the Festival Orchestra; the Night of Dance & the Night of Song; the Meadow in Wesoła: the ETNO Village for little ones and grownups – all weaving into a three-day cycle of meetings, tales, and community music-making. Romani songs of the road and music running wild and without frontiers from traditional to avant-garde forms. Dance parties, workshops, concerts, and Art Color Ballet’s Bursztynowe drzewo / Amber Tree ethnomusical at the ICE Kraków Congress Centre. Artists from Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Syria, Iran, Turkey, Armenia, and Kenya. We warmly welcome you to the 26th EtnoKraków // Crossroads/Rozstaje Festival.

Concert at the Break of Dawn. Prologue

A concert of Polish, Serbian, and Ukrainian songs that draw on the symbolism of fire, water, and the traditions of Kupala Night, Midsummer’s Eve, and St John’s Night Festival, will open this year’s EtnoKraków // Crossroads/Rozstaje Festival. This extraordinary unplugged vocal event – without wires, plugs, electricity, or amplification – starts with the sunrise, that is around 4am, on 23 June. The Concert at the Break of Dawn on the Bulwar Inflancki section of Vistula Embankments is not only the culmination of this year’s Kraków Wianki but the harbinger of the festival’s 26th edition as well. The lineup includes a group of friends gathered around Joanna Słowińska, a charismatic artist drawing inspiration from archaic Polish and Slavic ritual songs. Anna Sitko leading Daj Ognia band drawing from Polish and Scandinavian musical traditions. Sofia Herian will stand at the helm of all-women singing band Ruta Miata to perform Ukrainian Kupala songs, while Łada, specialists in the musical practice of archaic Southern Slaves, will present Serbian ritual songs.

The Myth of Beginnings

Our journey begins at Kraków’s Eden – the Botanical Garden of Jagiellonian University. Founded and opened two hundred and fifty years ago as a haven for residents and visitors alike, this tranquil oasis waiting for your visit. On 4 July, Hamdam Trio from Syria/Iran will drench its lush exotic flora with weaves of Persian music deeply rooted in Sufi tradition. Drawing inspiration from the radif repertoire and poetic verses of Rumi, the founder of whirling dervishes, they transport us through a tradition that’s been with us for a millennium. Join Dariush Rasouli, virtuoso of the ney flute, tar lute, and tombak drum, Wassim Ibrahim, master of the oud lute, singer and composer, and Arad Emamgholi from Iran, renowned for his skill with the daf drum.

4 July also brings Senjawazabawa to the concert hall of Strefa Nowa. This remarkable collaboration by Agata Harz and Katarzyna Szurman results from their partnership with Paula Kinaszewska, Marta Maślanka, and Bartek Woźniak. The artists discover the uncanny power of ancient lullabies, tapping into the generations of collective memory retaining the archetype of childhood. They go looking for universal qualities delving into states of wakefulness and dream, where boundaries between the past, present, and future have blurred, and into the symbolism of play and all the realms where, as they say, “the waking life melds with dream, and dream melds with paths we follow into the unknown, where the impossible becomes real, and where what is real mingles with imagination”. All that to the sound of Polish lullabies, folk ditties, flashes of old merrymaking, and selected motifs from Lithuanian, African, and Solomon Islands cultures, celebrating the multicultural experience of childhood.

Third of the concerts opening this years EtnoKraków // Crossroads/Rozstaje to be held on Thursday, 4 July brings to you Suferi and takes you on a trip beginning in Męcina in the Beskid Mały Mountains, via Carpathian traditions, and oberka melodies and rhythms, to take you into the open spaces of modern jazz, electronic beats, and hip-hop. A boundaries- and genres-defying musical odyssey pulsing with tradtion ad rhythms of the city awaits, guided by Kacper Malisz, Andrzej Imierowicz, and Miłosz Berdzik. Hold tight for the last ride of the day! And ride hard!

Green Haven: ETNO Village for the young and the young at heart

Nestled next to Jagiellonian University’s Botanical Garden, Łąka na Wesołej / Meadow in Wesoła in a district transforming from the historical hospital complex into a new urban retreat in dead city centre. It promises to be Kraków’s oasis: a verdant zone to relaxa, breathe, and enjoy community spirit. At Meadow in Wesoła, we are building ETNO Village: a three-day (5–7 July) programme of family workshops and encounters with music. Meadow in Wesoła is a friendly haven brimming with stories, dances, collaborative music-making, and a celebration of global musical traditions, designed to ensure a joyful atmosphere for visitors of all ages. Guides for our youngest festival-goers will be Piotr Dorosz, Kasia Chodoń, Skrzaciki band, Asia Mieszkowicz, and Szépszerével band from Hungary. On Friday evening, the Meadow in Wesoła hosts the Night of Dance (7:00–9:50pm) with the Festival Orchestra including performances by Sawa, Szépszerével, Daniel Kübler, and a band from Mogilany. This fusion of dance and music from the Vistula to the Danube rivers will bring you wedding songs, songs of recruits and cadets, pastoral tunes, Krakowiaks, Obereks, and circle dances.

The Clock Strikes: Myth of the Apocalypse

JINJ is Armenian for “serene”. The music of Sevana Tchakerian & Gor Tadevosyan duo is a therapeutic and quietening digest ranging from traditional Armenian folk songs to underground rap, a way of confronting trauma and the pressures of the permanent state of war. Catch their performance at 6:00pm on 5 July in Strefa Nowa. Friday, 5 July, sees the Night of Songs kicked off by Maryjka – the figure of St Mary near Apteka Designu – the Design Pharmacy at 9:50pm, with Dziad z lirą / Beggar with a Lyre doomsday chant drawing a vision of the world's ending and empty hopes of redemption. At 10pm, the event will move in to Strefa Nowa, where Joanna Słowińska and Zofia Słowińska-Brózda(Droga / The Road), Krakoskie Kumoszki choir (Od świtu po zmierzch / From Dawn to Dusk), and Jacek Hałas (Zegar bije / The Clock Strikes) will explore life, death, continuity, and transience through music in a musical approaching the subject of death and taming it. A most timely accomplishment at an age that deems death unfashionable and neglected, and treats it instrumentally, rendering it obnoxious. Here, we will stop beside death and face death: in the folk songs. They remind us in a simple and organic manner that death is a borderline, crucial and inevitable aspect of our fate.

The Night of Dance will resume at midnight, transforming listeners into dancers with the captivating whirl of the Oberek dance. Gracing the Night of Dance’s Open Stage will be the Siwka and Sawa bands, and musicians gathered in the Krakowski Dom Tańca / Kraków House of Dance initiative.

Journey Towards the Within: Winyo, The Migrating Bird, and the Romani songs of the road

The captivating duo of Łukasz Ojdana and Mariia Ojdana weave a tale on the crossroads of cultures: Polish and Ukrainian traditional music bound through improvisation and composition in their concert entitled Wędrujący ptak/ The Migrating Bird.

The duo’s performance in Strefa Nowa on 6 July is the onstage premiere of the material released on a CD midway through this May. Its brainfather is Łukasz Ojdana – a distinguished pianist and a leading figure in the Polish jazz scene, joined on stage by his wife Mariia. The lodestar is the titular bird, whose multifaceted symbolism ventures into the spiritual, metaphysical, and community realms. In Ukrainian folklore, birds are construed mystical embodiments of the human soul that uses the bird to be flown to each newborn child, only to depart by a bird to the other dimension upon their death. Folk music treats birds as enigmatic figures delivering news, with the dialogue between the human and the bird forms a significant motif in traditional Ukrainian songs.

The name of Bird: Winyo in the Luo language from around Lake Victoria in western Kenya was adopted by a Kenyan musician Shiphton Onyango for his artistic pursuits. With his Benga-style music, songs in his native Dholuo, and Swahili and English, he will have us gathered at Łąka na Wesołej / Meadow in Wesoła on 6th July. Alongside Winyo, Saturday open-air stage at Wesoła will be graced by a legend of the folk scene: Muzykanci band heralding their new double album: Muzykanci live from WOMEX Budapest studio recorded and produced by the BBC, and Julia Kozakovawith the Manuša project: a revelation of the Slovak and Romani music scene that promotes one of the finest recent albums on the Central European world music stage.

Epilogue: The Amber Tree

The performance is woven around the myth of eternal wandering. A tale of “the olden times and new”, a narrative about the roots of Central European identity. On Sunday evening, 7 July, at ICE Kraków Congress Centre. Directed and choreographed by Agnieszka Glińska, with music by Stanisław Słowiński, and lyrics by Jan Słowiński. On stage: Art Color Ballet, Stanisław Słowiński Quintet & string quartet, Joanna Słowińska (vocals), and Karol Śmiałek (vocals). Visuals by Szymon Kamykowski and Piotr Słodkowicz. Inviting you warmly to The Amber Tree, we hereby let critics speak:

“An ethnomusical at its best! An unforgettable journey through history: roaming around Europe with ancient peoples it explores a world that cannot even be touched today. Resurrected in poetic sequences composed of body movement, the art of bodypainting, live music, and sets meticulously crafted down to each and every detail, that world resurrects on the stage, reminiscent of a strange, primordial dream. Outstanding vocalisations by Joanna Słowińska and Karol Śmiałek, the beauty of the human body – they all combine into images that leave the audience in aesthetic awe. An incredibly visual, oneiric extravaganze, carrying dance, live music, and the Proto-Slavic soul within it. An absolute must-see!” (Iga Dzieciuchowicz, e-teatr.pl)

“The borders of European countries fluctuated over time in tides and ebbs of legacies, changing influences, and deepening the cultural eclecticism of societies. All this can be seen, all this can be heard: ‘The world is described / In shards of tablets, on pages / There are facts dressed in myth / And myth where you expected fact.’ Stanisław Słowiński created compositions stark and crude, Jan Słowiński wrote the original lyrics, and Joanna Słowińska sings them in a manner rending the heart: ‘Nothing will alter time / There is darkness, dawn will come / There is enough Earth for us / There are enough days.’ A mystery play reaching the highest branches of the tree and descending deep into its roots – roots that reach into the prehistory of the ancient peoples migrating all across Europe.” (Krzysztof Niedźwiedzki)

Join us at the Crossroads/Rozstaje! In (Etno)Kraków!

Jan Słowiński

Director of EtnoKraków // Crossroads/Rozstaje Festival

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EtnoKraków // Crossroads/Rozstaje 2024 | Roaming

Organiser: ROZSTAJE: u Zbiegu Kultur i Tradycji. Stowarzyszenie

Jan Słowiński – Director of EtnoKraków // Crossroads/Rozstaje Festival

Supported financially by: Kraków Municipality, Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, Małopolska Region

Supporting Partner: Agencja Rozwoju Miasta Krakowa spółka z o.o.