“Energy, freedom, and humor.” – Dorota Szwarcman, Polityka magazine.
Exchange – Spółdzielnia Muzyczna Ensemble in concert
Music Current Festival
10 April 2026
Spółdzielnia Muzyczna is among Poland’s most dynamic ensembles specialising in the performance of contemporary music. The musicians have graced renowned festivals such as MaerzMusik in Berlin, the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik in Darmstadt, AFEKT in Estonia, and a wealth of Polish ones – the Warsaw Autumn International Festival of Contemporary Music, Sacrum Profanum, Audio Art, Unsound, and Musica Polonica Nova. Their most noteworthy accolade includes the prestigious Ensemble Prize awarded by the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation, as well as nominations for the Coryphaeus of Polish Music and the 2022 Fryderyk awards in the Contemporary Music Album of the Year category.
Żaneta Rydzewska, Whoops, my bad…
This twenty-minute composition combines electroacoustic music with light, video, and elements of an interactive plant installation. The audience is invited to actively participate in the evolving composition by voting online and co-creating its structure. Through references to ecology, empathy, and the relationship between humans and nature, the piece provokes reflection on humans within the natural environment.
Barbara Zach, Conocybe filaris
Conocybe filaris is the third composition in an ongoing series of works inspired by various species of fungi. This time, the inspiration comes from a mushroom that appears entirely ordinary, small, unremarkable, and seemingly harmless. And yet, inside that modest form lies a slow and certain suffering. This piece is a meditation on invisible violence – harm that dresses itself in calmness, in kindness, infamiliarity. It reflects on the kind of damage that doesn’t leave bruises. On quiet cruelty. On poisonous words delivered with a smile. On structures that seem neutral, protective even, but which corrode the self from the inside out. We are often slow to believe we are being harmed. Sometimes they arrive as silence; sometimes as softness. But over time, the whispers grow sharper; the harm deepens. The softness turns to scar tissue, and the aftermath is hard to survive.
Yue Song, Big Data
This new work by Yue Song, written specially for Spółdzielnia Muzyczna, considers the relationship between people and the real world in the era of “Big Data”. Immersed in a constant flow of information, we rarely find a moment of pause. Only when a device’s battery runs out, temporarily disconnecting us from the digital world, can we briefly reconnect with nature and sense the subtle atmosphere around us. Once the device is fully charged, the noise of data returns. Through the combination of chamber music and electronics, the piece depicts this cycle of disconnection and reconnection in daily life.
Programme
Żaneta Rydzewska, Whoops, my bad… (2025)
Barbara Zach, Conocybe filaris (2025)
Yue Song, Big Data* (2025)
*Commissioned by Spółdzielnia Muzyczna.
Performers and Production Team
PERFORMERS
Małgorzata Mikulska, flute
Tomasz Sowa, clarinet
Krzysztof Guńka, saxophone
Paulina Woś, violin/viola
Barbara Mglej, violin/viola
Jakub Gucik, cello
Aleksander Wnuk, percussion
Aleksandra Płaczek, piano/keyboards
Yue Song, electronics
Fergal McKeown, sound
Chris Keogh, video projection
Aidan Whelan, lighting
Paul Lynch, stage management
About the Ensemble
Spółdzielnia Muzyczna is among Poland’s most dynamic ensembles specialising in the performance of contemporary music. The musicians have graced renowned festivals such as MaerzMusik in Berlin, the Internationale Ferienkurse für Neue Musik in Darmstadt, AFEKT in Estonia, and a wealth of Polish ones – the Warsaw Autumn International Festival of Contemporary Music, Sacrum Profanum, Audio Art, Unsound, and Musica Polonica Nova. Their most noteworthy accolade includes the prestigious Ensemble Prize awarded by the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation, as well as nominations for the Coryphaeus of Polish Music and the 2022 Fryderyk awards in the Contemporary Music Album of the Year category.
Spółdzielnia Muzyczna is strongly connected to Kraków, its home city, where it has long developed a variety of regular projects. These include INTERAKCJE / INTERACTIONS – concerts combined with open discussions bridging the creator–performer–audience divide; PLAYGROUND: call for collaborations inviting selected artists to compose together, culminating in the performance of the jointly developed works; OPEN SPACE – workshops in new instrumental techniques for composers; as well as OTWÓRZ USZY, OTWÓRZ OCZY / OPEN YOUR EARS / OPEN YOUR EYES and SPÓŁDZIELNIA NA MIEJSCU / SPÓŁDZIELNIA IS HERE educational and interdisciplinary events designed to open broad audiences to introduce new sounds. As part of the last initiative, Spółdzielnia also organises RYTMICZNE WIERSZOWANKI / RHYMES IN RHYTHM sessions for children where they set well-known poems by Polish poets to sound, incorporating among others elements of body music; ORKIESTRA HAŁASÓW / THE ORCHESTRA OF NOISES with music made together on unconventional instruments; and SPACER DŹWIĘKOWY / SOUND WALK during which participants prick up their ears to the sounds of the city.
In its programs, the ensemble tries to combine the classics of the 20th century with the music of the young generation, giving a special place to Polish artists such as: Zygmunt Krauze, Paweł Mykietyn, Agata Zubel, Andrzej Kwieciński, Artur Zagajewski, Piotr Peszat, Monika Szpyrka, Piotr Tabakiernik, Anna Sowa, Nina Fukuoka, Martyna Kosecka, Marta Śniady, Paweł Malinowski, Jacek Sotomski, Aleksander Nowak and Cezary Duchnowski. Spółdzielnia Muzyczna repertoire also includes compositions by Alex Mincek, Anna Thorvaldsdottir, Malin Bång, Marco Ciciliani, Alex Paxton, Joanna Bailie, Oscar Escudero, David Fennessy, Johannes Kreidler, Ricardo Eizirik, Matthew Shlomowitz, Trondem Reinholdtsen, Gerard Grisey, Franco Donatoni, Giacinto Scelsi, Olivier Messiaen, Pierre Boulez, Luciano Berio, Morton Feldman, George Crumb, Georges Aperghis and Salvatore Sciarrino.
Support Credit
In partnership with the Contemporary Music Centre, Dublin; Supported by the Arts Council; With the friendly support of Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation.
Dates & Times
10 April
8pm
Tickets
€10 tickets until 10 March
€22/20 thereafter
Space
Space Upstairs
Duration
60 minutes
Genres
FestivalLive MusicMusic
https://vimeo.com/
Support Project Arts Centre and join us in developing the next generation of contemporary artists in Ireland
