Warsaw Village Band
| Warsaw Village Band (Kapela ze wsi Warszawa) |
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The band at a concert in Bremen in October 2010
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| Background information | |
| Origin | Warsaw, Poland |
| Genres | Polish folk music with modern elements |
| Years active | 1998–present |
| Labels | Jaro |
| Website | www.warsawvillageband.net |
| Members |
Maja Kleszcz - cello and vocals |
Maja Kleszcz - cello and vocals
Magdalena Sobczak - cimbalom and vocals
Sylwia Świątkowska - violin, suka, vocals
Wojciech Krzak - violin, hurdy gurdy, jaw harp
Piotr Gliński - bęben (drum)
Warsaw Village Band (Polish: Kapela ze wsi Warszawa) is a band from Warsaw, Poland, that plays traditional Polish folk music tunes combined with modern elements.
According to the band's manifesto, it was formed as a response to mass culture and narrow-mindedness, "which in fact leads to [the] destruction of human dignity." Indeed, after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the expansion of the European Union to most of the former Warsaw Pact countries, Poland's economy has grown dramatically, while at the same time ushering in investment by a number of multinational corporations, leading to concerns of globalism and loss of Poland's cultural identity.
Warsaw Village Band was intended to be a response to this trend by exploring Poland's musical traditions and making them relevant to its new capitalist economy. Member Wojciech Krzak has stated that "after the nightmare of Communism, we still have to fight for our identity, and we know that beauty and identity are still in our roots." Krzak has further stated that the band are "trying to create a new cultural proposition for the youth in an alternative way to contemporary show-biz." The band's very name appears to evoke what troubles Krzak about Poland's new capitalism: many large Polish cities do not have suburbs in the traditional sense, leading to unsettling transitions directly from city to field. To this end, in Wykorzenienie (Uprooting), the band traveled throughout Poland to find and record older musicians who still played almost-forgotten styles of music, thereafter incorporating those melodies into new songs and expounding upon them.
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Wikipedia