The rather unique combination of instruments - a piano duo coupled with a percussion duo - is one of its kind in Poland, and one of only a few in the world. The ensemble is comprised of Emilia Sitarz and Bartłomiej Wąsik (the Lutosławski Piano Duo), and Magdalena Kordylasińska and Miłosz Pękala (the Hob-Beats Duo).
The group was propelled to fame following their spectacular success at the Ninth New Tradition / Nowa Tradycja Folk Music Festival, where they won the Grand Prize, the People's Prize and the Warsaw Presidential Award. Their success garnered much acclaim from critics, who praised the group's stylistically progressive approach to folk music.
Engaging in a somewhat unusual but certainly inventive musical dialogue, the function of either instrumental pairing is apparently swapped, almost imperceptibly, as the piano morphs into a percussion instrument, and the percussion fulfils the role of a melodic instrument. The incisiveness and precision of the group's playing, the seemingly raw and primitive sound of their music, and the instrumentalists' ability to engage with their public is what sets them apart as an ensemble definitely worth seeing. There is also much scope for improvisation in their music, and the group clearly aims to create as many diverse and interesting sounds as possible by taking full advantage of their instruments' timbral qualities.
Kwadrofonik's newest project - literally I Was Here, Fryderyk - or perhaps more accurately, Fryderyk was Here - is concerned with finding folk influences in the music of Chopin. According to the group:
The concert presents a fictional narrative, a sort of fantasy exploring what it was that the composer was able to hear in folk music, the things that touched him most before his departure from Poland, and which significant melodies he took with him, only later to reuse them in his preludes, mazurkas and sonatas. With the aid of two pianos and a richly varied percussion section, we aim to combine raw and authentic folk music with the rather more mannered, aristocratic world that contains Chopin's music.
Kwadrofonik will perform at the Bethlehem Chapel in Prague on February 8, 2011. The concert will bring to a close the series of events marking the Chopin Year celebrations in the Czech Republic, while simultaneously inaugurating two new concert series: Salon Polski" / "Polish Salon and the Ambassadors Concert Series.
Source: press release