Olga Kozieł

A singer and traditional culture researcher. Kozieł plays the trumpet, percussion instruments as well as dances. She is a member of various groups that blend traditional and avant-garde music.

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Olga Kozieł, photo: Grzegorz Domański / press materials

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Olga Kozieł was born in 1989 in Lublin, where she graduated from a State Primary Music School in the piano class. In retrospect, she admits that this educational path was far too demanding for her.

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I did not handle the constant pressure well, the stressful exams and the constant reminders that there is only one piano in a philharmonic hall, so it is an instrument for only the best. Today I think the whole classical education system is set on the wrong foundations. Whilst at school, I have never heard that it is worth experimenting, having fun with singing or playing the instrument. It is a pity that no one told me I could take pleasure from mastering a new piece of music.

Therefore one can say that Kozieł's music education began in 2005, when she met Jan Bernad and started singing in the group he led. The Lublin-based singer, actor and cultural researcher is a pivotal figure for the renaissance of traditional music in Poland. Bernad was the initiator of the Muzyka Kresów (Music of the Borderlands) foundation dedicated to the study of traditional and sacred music of the region. He was also involved in establishing the Centre for Intercultural Creative Initiatives CROSSROADS in Lublin. Alongside educational activities, these groups were responsible for festivals such as Oldest Songs of Europe and The Festival of Traditional and Avant-garde Music CODES. Kozieł was involved in all these initiatives. ‘This was my environment.’ she recalls.

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I was very much involved as a volunteer during the successive editions of the festivals. I felt at home, so it was easy for me to ‘host’ artists to spend time with them. At the same time, I began to embrace the avant-garde scene and deepened my knowledge of traditional music. I have very fond memories of that time, and I still keep in touch with some musicians that I met there.

Above all, however, whilst being in the group led by Bernad, Kozieł developed as an artist. She participated in weekly rehearsals and workshops, playing concerts and attending festivals. Every year she took part in the International Summer School of Traditional Music. In the group comprised of eight singers, Kozieł worked on a repertoire consisting of Polish, Ukrainian, Russian and Serbian traditional songs under the supervision of ethnomusicologists. Being a member of that ensemble for eight years, Kozieł became aware that she wanted to pursue music professionally. In recalling that time, the singer only regrets that she was involved in the Lublin-based environment to such an extent that she missed out on other groups engaged in traditional music. ‘It seemed to me that there was no one else interested in the field and that we were an exclusive group knowing these songs. Because of this, for years, I missed other festivals, visits to the villages, getting to know traditional singers and musicians.’

Transformative journeys

As a singer and instrumentalist, Kozieł is a member of many ensembles cultivating Polish rural traditions. These range from large musical ensembles to small groups. The biggest of them is the Warsaw-Lublin Brass Band, founded in 2017, which draws inspiration from the brass bands of the Lublin and Roztocze regions, and the vocal group Z Lasu which sings traditional songs from the Ukrainian and Belarusian Roztocze. Such musical initiatives have sometimes resulted from field studies and ethnomusicological research, which the artist willingly undertakes. ‘It is then that I meet people with whom I travel back in time, look into their childhood, their touching memories, the songs of their youth, the music which accompanied the most important moments of their lives’, explains Kozieł. ‘And from each journey, I come back a little bit changed. Immersed in sounds, which sometimes sprouted ideas for concerts and projects and gave me the motivation to sing.’

Kozieł's adventure with songs from Wołyń began in a slightly different manner. It started with director Wojciech Smarzowski, who invited the singer Maniucha Bikont to participate in his film Wołyń. Her task was to prepare the music which would accompany the scenes of a village wedding. When Bikont was looking for female singers to work with, she contacted Kozieł, amongst others.

Whilst working on the set, the singer felt the need to take a closer look at the subject of these songs, especially as they were connected to the history of her family.

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My grandmother is one of the people who escaped from Wołyń in 1943. I know it sounds unbelievable that I hadn't heard too much about it before. People who survived the war are not always willing to talk about it. After a few months, I decided to look for Poles who had once lived in Wołyń on my own. I was interested in stories, melodies, memories. I started with the neighbours of my grandparents, and then I moved further and further. Finally, I went to Wołyń and visited the now non-existent village where my grandmother was born. This trip was very emotional for me.

During the trip, Kozieł met people who remembered the multicultural Wołyń, who told and sang to her about their youth. They remembered songs from the wedding repertoire best, and it was around that theme that the singer built her concert programme. She accompanies these songs with stories about the region, her family and the female singers she met on her way.

If Wołyń became a collective hero for Kozieł, the singer to whom the artist devoted special attention was Stanisław Brzozowy. Not only did she perform his songs and spend long hours talking to his daughter, the singer Genowefa Lenarcik, but she even wrote her master's thesis on him at the Warsaw musicology department. ‘His voice enchanted me from the first seconds of his singing coming from an old cassette tape’, recalls Kozieł. ‘I understood neither the text nor the melody. It was something beyond description – a voice as if from the guts; depth, power, but also a kind of fragility, sensitivity. It moved me to the core.’

Studying and performing Brzozowy's songs, the artist came away with some broader reflection. ‘I used to consider getting very close to the sound of my master's voice as the most significant task,’ recalls Kozieł.

Today, I know that I have to look for myself, my voice, my story in the old songs. It took me a long time to understand that I have to sing Brzozowy's songs with my voice and not by trying to sing like Brzozowy. Only then do these songs become mine, and I become theirs.

Between oberek and Ornette

Over the years, Kozieł's interest in the avant-garde became more evident in her music. The singer recalls that during one of the Summer Schools organised by Bernad, they started a simple vocal experiment, which turned into a performance later entitled Three Sounds. It drew from both traditional and contemporary music. These early experimental experiences paled before the Paris Umlaut Festival in 2011, which became a pivotal moment in Kozieł's artistic career. At this event, devoted primarily to improvised music, she met Sebastien Belieh – a French double bass player and composer. Together they formed Lumpeks, a group that presents traditional Polish melodies in an uncompromising improvised form.

In a line-up that might bring to mind Ornette Coleman's famous quartet (supplemented by Louis Laurain on trumpet and Pierre Borel on alto saxophone), the group translates mazurkas and obereks into the realm of free jazz. Kozieł explains the band’s methods:

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The work in Lumpeks is based on two things: a deep study of the melodies and improvisation […]. Sebastien chose pieces from archival recordings, made note transcriptions, sent the recordings to us to work on ourselves, and then at the rehearsal, we started by talking about what we heard there. I laugh that it's such a French thing - lots and lots of talking, discussing, and then the playing with no talking at all.

In 2019, the band won the Grand Prix of the New Tradition festival, winning a recording session in the studios of the Polish Radio. In 2020, the band's self-titled debut album was released to enthusiastic reviews. After the break caused by the pandemic, Lumpeks has ambitious plans for the coming years. ‘Next year we are planning to visit rural musicians – mainly violinists and harmonists’, reveals the singer. ‘We have been invited to an artistic residency in Strasbourg, where we will work on our new material. We plan to record it in the second half of next year and release it in early 2023.’

In the near future, there is also an album coming out by another band combining tradition and avant-garde, in which Kozieł is involved. She plays the trumpet in the group Zvanai, whose leader is another trumpeter – Kamil Szuszkiewicz. The band draws inspiration, amongst others, from Lithuanian sutartines – polyphonic songs based on simple parallel melodic lines.

Written by Jan Błaszczak Dec 2021, edited by AZ

contemporary polish folk music

Polish folk music

Wołyń

wojciech smarzowski