Włodek Pawlik at Ethno Jazz Festival: piano from the Grammy winner for “Night in Calisia”

Ethno Jazz Festival is honoured to invite you to a concert by an outstanding Polish jazz pianist, winner of the 2014 Grammy for “Night in Calisia”.

Włodek Pawlik’s concert takes place on 19 March in the atmospheric White Stork Synagogue, already familiar to Wrocław’s music lovers.

Włodek Pawlik (born 1958) is a pianist and composer who graduated from Professor Barbara Hesse-Bukowska’s piano class at the Fryderyk Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw. In 1990, he completed further studies in the Jazz Department at the Hochschule für Musik in Hamburg. In 2007, he earned a doctorate at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music, where he now lectures on improvisation. His output includes 24 original albums, numerous film scores and contemporary compositions.

He has won numerous national and international competitions. Warsaw’s legendary Jazz Club Akwarium has repeatedly honoured him as Jazz Musician of the Year. He performs at the largest, most prestigious jazz festivals, including North Sea Jazz Festival in The Hague (1998), European Jazz Festival in Athens (2006), Warsaw Summer Jazz Days and Jazz Jamboree, as well as classical festivals, including Misterium Stabat Mater at Wratislavia Cantans 2003. He leaves unforgettable impressions on listeners and receives enthusiastic critical reviews on every continent.

The festival magazine 'Who is who at North Jazz Festival 1998' honoured him with the description 'Vladimir Horowitz of jazz'. 'The Age' declared his Australian tour the biggest musical event of 2002, while American jazz magazine 'Down Beat' called 'Turtles', recorded with renowned trumpeter Randy Brecker, 'outstanding'.

Włodek Pawlik also composes film, theatre and radio-drama music, symphonic and vocal works, and contemporary ballet scores. He wrote music for Dorota Kędzierzawska’s award-winning “Wrony” and “Pora umierać”, Borys Lankosz’s “Rewers”, winner of Golden Lions at Gdynia’s 34th Polish Film Festival and Polish Film Academy Eagles 2010, and international productions Peter Greenaway’s “Nightwatching” and Marleen Gorris’s “Within the whirlwind”. Gorris won the Oscar for “Antonia's Line” in 1996.

His exceptional artistic achievements include “Misterium Stabat Mater”, awarded a Fryderyk 2005 for classical choral music, and the jazz project “Anhelli”, honoured by TVP Kultura in 2006 as Musical Event of the Year in rock and jazz. In 2008, he composed and recorded the jazz suite “Tykocin” with legendary trumpeter and multiple Grammy winner Randy Brecker. Music reviewers at Rzeczpospolita and Gazeta Wyborcza named it Jazz Album of the Year. For its music, Pawlik received honours including Jazz Composer of the Year 2009 in Los Angeles’s Jazz Station poll.

That same year, the pianist’s double solo album “Grand Piano” appeared, capturing his unique improvisations. In 2011 came “Struny na ziemi”, setting Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz’s poems to music performed by Lora Szafran and Marek Bałata, with recitations by Robert Więckiewicz. Rzeczpospolita named it Jazz Album of 2011. The soundtrack album for “Pora umierać” also appeared that year and was nominated for a Fryderyk 2011 in Film Music.

“Night in Calisia”, recorded by Randy Brecker and Włodek Pawlik, was released in 2012 and honoured with a Grammy this year.

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