Muzyka spod Radomia

This album is like spending an evening at a superb village folk night in Poland, which wouldn’t have existed 20 years ago. Th e music comes from the Radom region, 100km south of Warsaw, which has been at the heart of the recent revival. It’s mazurka rhythms are performed mainly on violins, accompanied by accordions and frame drums. Deep and earthy.

Most of the young musicians have been inspired by a handful of surviving genuine folk musicians. Looking through the booklet, most of the players were born in the 1980s and 90s, some in the 2000s, but among them are names like fiddler Jana Adamczyk (b1936), singer and pedal accordionist Wiesława Gromadzka (b1949), and saxophonist Zdzisława Kwapinski (b1951). Th e revival means that many of these musicians can be appreciated and celebrated while they are still with us. And acknowledgement is paid to the ethnographer Andrzej Bieńkowski, without whom this revival would probably never have happened. There are few internationally known names here – Paula Kinaszewska and Bartłomiej Woźniak – but that’s not the point. This is a celebration of a lively and reinvigorated local scene.