Musical tribute to Gdańsk mayor
PR dla Zagranicy
Grzegorz Siwicki
18.01.2019 08:00
Polish composer Katarzyna Kwiecień-Długosz has written a piece for carillon in memory of the late mayor of Gdańsk, Paweł Adamowicz.
A heart shaped with candles as a tribute to the murdered mayor at Solidarity Square in Gdańsk. Photo: PAP/Adam Warżawa
The five-minute epitaph will have its premiere on Friday, performed by Monika Kaźmierczak on a carillon housed in the tower of the northern Polish city’s St. Catherine’s Church.
Kaźmierczak has told Poland's PAP news agency that the work was composed on Monday, shortly after the announcement of the mayor’s death.
Adamowicz, 53, was attacked and stabbed several times by a 27-year-old knife-wielding man during a high-profile annual charity drive on Sunday evening. He died the next day in a hospital from severe wounds despite efforts by doctors to save him.
The epitaph’s opening motif is based on the sequence of notes A, D, A, in reference to the mayor’s last name, while the concluding phrase ends with the notes G, D, A, in reference to the name of the city.
Kaźmierczak said that, as soon as she wrote about the piece on social media, she was contacted by carillon players from many countries who wished to perform the work as an expression of solidarity with the people of Gdańsk.
One such performance took place in Leuven, Belgium, on Wednesday. More are scheduled in the Netherlands and the United States.
Gdańsk is the only city in Poland and one of eight in Europe to have carillons. In addition to the one at St. Catherine’s Church, there is another in the City Hall tower.
The carillon is a musical instrument consisting of a series of up to 77 cast bronze bells (at least 23) played serially by skilful artists from a manual and pedal console to produce a melody, or sounded together to play a chord.
(mk/gs)