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23rd Mozart Festival, June 20-July 21

The Mozart Festival, a flagship project by the WarsawChamber Opera, was first held in 1991 to mark 200 yearssince the death of the great composer from Vienna. The ideafor this unique event came from the Warsaw ChamberOpera’s founder and director Stefan Sutkowski and stagedirector Ryszard Peryt. As a result of their efforts, Warsaw isthe only city in the world where all the pieces Mozart everwrote for the stage are performed every year.

The 23rd Mozart Festival will differ from those held inprevious years. According to Warsaw Chamber Opera artis-tic director Ruben Silva, the festival has been reinvented towelcome wider audiences.

The festival will kick off June 20 and continue until agrand multimedia staging of Don Giovanni at the WilanówPalace courtyard July 21.

As every year, Warsaw audiences will also hear Mozart’smasses, symphonies, concertos and chamber pieces. The fes-tival venues will include some of Warsaw’s finest historicsites, including the Royal Castle, the Stanis∏awowski Theaterin the Royal ¸azienki Park, and the Holy Cross Church.

www.operakameralna.pl

bilety.operakameralna.pl

19th Jazz in the Old Town international open-air festival, June 22-Aug. 17

In its 19th year, the Jazz in the Old Town international open-air festival is widely regarded as an inseparable part of thesummer season in Warsaw and one of the city’s biggesttourist attractions. Festival concerts are held every Saturdaynight at 7 p.m. in the atmospheric setting of the Old TownSquare.

As every year, the organizers promise a variety of jazzgenres, from mainstream and world jazz to modern jazz,

fusion and flamenco jazz. This year’s highlights include con-certs by Enrico Pieranunzi, Jorge Pardo and Jacky Terrason.

Upcoming concerts

July 6KahibaPremiere. The DownBeat magazine describes Kahiba as anexciting and creative European trio. Austrian saxophonistand flutist Heinrich von Kalnein, accordion player ChristianBakanic and Swiss drummer Gregor Hilbe play captivatingmusic where jazz blends with Brazilian, Jewish and worldmusic.

July 13Jacky Terrasson TrioNew York-based and French-born Jacky Terrasson is one ofthe best and most popular young jazz pianists. The SundayTimes magazine has named him among the 30 greatest fig-ures in music. The piano virtuoso has performed with a num-ber of female vocalists, including Betty Carter, DianneReeves, Dee Dee Bridgewater and Cassandra Wilson.

July 20Hiromi Trio ProjectFirst time in Poland. Japanese jazz star Hiromi, a pianist andcomposer, plays a unique combination of jazz, progressiverock and classical music. The winner of many prestigiousmusic awards, she duetted with Chick Corea at the tenderage of 17 and has since released nine award-winning albums.Critics rave about her virtuosity, impressive playing tech-nique and expressive performances. During her one-night-only concert in Poland, Hiromi will play with AnthonyJackson on bass and Simon Phillips on drums.

July 27Adam Ba∏dych ProjectMany critics see violin virtuoso Adam Ba∏dych as the futureof the jazz violin. Ba∏dych, who also writes and producesmusic, releases albums on the prestigious ACT Music label.Hailed a child prodigy at 16, today he is compared to theworld’s greatest jazz players. Ba∏dych is this year’s winnerof the Echo Jazz Award given to the best jazz performersaround the world.

www.jazznastarowce.pl

Chopin Concerts at Royal ¸azienki Park, eachSunday until the end of September

Music by Frederic Chopin has been performed live beneaththe Chopin Monument in Royal ¸azienki Park since 1959.The concerts are held between May and September eachSunday at noon and 4 p.m. Over the five decades, they havebecome a local tradition and a major tourist attraction.

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The Chopin Monument, designed by sculptor Wac∏awSzymanowski and unveiled in 1926, was destroyed by theGermans during World War II. Following meticulous recon-struction, it was restored to its former site in ¸azienki Parkin 1958 and the Chopin concerts began the following year.

tifc.chopin.pl

Warsfolk international folk song and dance festival, Aug. 24-25

Held every summer since 2005 at Sowiƒski Park inWarsaw’s Wola district, the festival brings together hun-dreds of performers from Europe.

www.warsfolk.pl

10th Singer’s Warsaw Festival of Jewish Culture,Aug.24-Sept. 1

The Singer’s Warsaw Festival of Jewish Culture and theJewish Culture Festival in Cracow are two of Poland’slargest events of this kind.

The Warsaw festival, first held in 2004, is dedicated tothe memory of Polish-born Jewish American Nobel Prize-winning writer Isaac Bashevis Singer, many of whosebooks were set in small Jewish towns in prewar Poland.Using his fiction as inspiration, the festival takes audiencesto a bygone world of Yiddish culture recreated on

Warsaw’s Pró˝na Street and Grzybowski Square. Thissomewhat overlooked corner of Warsaw transforms duringthe festival into a singing and dancing shtetl—or a smallJewish town—from a century ago with haggling merchants,wineries and bakeries.

The festival abounds in outdoor concerts, theatrical plays,exhibitions and activities during which audiences can learnhow to make Jewish cut-outs, write Hebrew characters anddance Jewish dances. There are also movie screenings, artinstallations, lectures and meetings with writers. A guest ofhonor at this year’s festival will be Israel Zamir, the son ofIsaac Bashevis Singer.

This year’s music performers will include cantors YaccowLemmer and Dudu Fisher, Canadian jazz pianist Ron Davisand Polish jazz trumpet virtuoso Tomasz Staƒko, who willgive a joint performance with the Kroke klezmer band. Thestars of the festival’s Klezmer Night concert will be interna-tionally famous band The Other Europeans.

Theater performers at this year’s Singer’s Warsaw festivalwill come from France, Australia, Argentina and Romania.The Jewish Theater from Bucharest will stage Yentl, a playbased on the short story by Singer.

www.festiwalsingera.pl

Warsaw Cross-Culture Festival, Sept. 26-29

The Warsaw Cross-Culture Festival was first held in 2005to showcase the most interesting trends in world music. It

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has since made its way into Warsaw’s cultural landscapeand is one of the largest festivals of its kind in CentralEurope with a large group of faithful fans. Along withconcerts, each festival comprises workshops in music,singing and dance conducted by internationally renownedinstructors. Festival audiences can also attend exhibitions,see on-screen musicals and there are also activities forchildren.

The motto of this year’s festival, “Islands of the World,”announces guests from remote islands and overseas territo-ries. The performers hail from Trinidad and Tobago, Belizeand Honduras in Central America, the French island ofRéunion on the Indian Ocean, New Zealand, Sardinia,Djerba in Tunisia and the ice-cold islands of northernCanada.

According to festival organizer Andrzej Matusiak, thisgeographical diversity was a tough challenge for the orga-nizers. “We have invited dozens of artists from five conti-nents so that our festival tent is like a multicultural islanditself this September,” Matusiak said.

During the festival’s four days in September, Warsawaudiences will dance to American calypso music, learn aboutthe traditions of the Garifuna people from the Caribbean, lis-ten to traditional songs composed by descendants of slavesfrom Africa, hear how maloya music from Réunion blendswith French and funky beats, and find out what “oceanicblues” sounds like.

www.festival.warszawa.pl

Eating Out■ Warsaw has a lot to offer for any demanding palate—fromrestaurants serving dishes from around the world to thosespecializing in Italian, French and Hungarian cuisine, toTex-Mex, fusion cuisine and somewhat more exotic flavorsfrom Lebanon. There are also plenty of elegant sushi places,which have mushroomed in recent years. Fans of Asian cui-sine will find a wide selection of decent Chinese, Indian andThai restaurants as well as many Vietnamese eateries popu-lar for their tasty and inexpensive dishes.

Any visitor to Poland should, naturally, try traditionalPolish cuisine with its staple dishes such as the barszcz beet-root soup, zimne nó˝ki pig’s knuckles in aspic, and thefamous bigos stew of cabbage, sauerkraut, sausage, mush-rooms and a variety of other ingredients. Warsaw has recent-ly gained its own equivalent of the Italian pizzeria withdozens of pierogarnia restaurants, which specialize in Polishpierogi dumplings. You can get them in all variations andsizes with a wide selection of fillings: meat, cabbage andmushrooms, cheese and spinach, or blueberries if you likeyour pierogi sweet.

If you want to make sure you have tried it all, don’t forgetto check out a zapiekanka stand with long rolls cut in halfand roasted with cheese and ketchup on top. This Warsawfast food, to be eaten on the go, dates back to the communistdays when global fast-food chains were not yet available inPoland.

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Quality dining in Poland has been acknowledged by thefamous Michelin guide for gourmands, which has listed someof Poland’s best restaurants since 1997. The latest edition ofthe Michelin guide recommends 21 restaurants in Warsaw.One of them, Atelier Amaro (www.atelieramaro.pl), is thefirst Polish restaurant ever to have received a Michelin star inrecognition of the chef’s skills, cooking style and use of localingredients.

Shopping in Warsaw■ Warsaw is also a perfect place to go on a shopping spree.The city has come a long way since the communist era wheneverything was in short supply and you needed to stand in

long lines in order to get hold of anything. Since the 1990s,many elegant shopping malls have opened in and around thecity with hundreds of stores stocking leading Polish andglobal brands. Here are a few popular addresses:

ARKADIA, 82 Jana Paw∏a Ave., open Mon.-Sat. 10 a.m.-10p.m., Sun. 10 a.m.-9 p.m.BLUE CITY, 179 Jerozolimskie Ave., open Mon.-Sat. 10a.m.-10 p.m., Sun. 10 a.m.-8 p.m.PROMENADA, 75c Ostrobramska St., open Mon.-Sat. 10a.m.-9 p.m., Sun. 10 a.m.-8 p.m.Z¸OTE TARASY, 59 Z∏ota St., open Mon.-Sat. 9 a.m.-10p.m., Sun. 9 a.m.-9 p.m.

Marcin Mierzejewski

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