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May 2016Seven Sonnets at Aural Aggravation
Christopher Nosnibor writes at “Aural Agravation” about new CD “Seven Sonets” fragment from review:
‘Sweet love’ builds subtle drama, Glowicka skipping lightly through Sonnet LVI, before ‘All Naked’, a stripped-back audiowork which is spun around Sonnet XXVI concludes the album, leaving the listener feeling… how precisely does the listener feel? The power of any work lies not in the direct message it conveys, but in the way it resonates with each individual who engages with said work. Just as Shakespeare’s plays and sonnets stir different emotional responses in each person, connecting with different life experiences, so Glowicka’s Seven Sonnets is and album which does not require a critic to steer a particular line of engagement. It resonates on a uniquely personal, individual level.
Oct 2015'Jazz n More' on 'Red Sun'
May issue of the magazine “Jazz n More” publishes review of ‘Red Sun’. Below an excerpt: All sound phenomena happen in time and space. But few sound artists use those dimensions specifically to make it the exclusive theme of their compositions as do the two Polish women: Glowicka and Walentynowicz in “Red Sun”. The piano and the subtly draped around itClicks’n’Cutsof the electronic noises play skilfully with the space, let these times enlarge and widen, but then again appear in narrow and claustrophobic proximity.
Oct 2015'Muzyka 21' reviews 'Red Sun'
Polish online art magazine Muzyka 21 has published an article on music of Glowicka. Polish critic Jan Topolski writes his impressions about the new CD ‘Red Sun’:
What makes the music of Katarina Głowicka special? First of all space. Deep and extensive. As in ambient music. Built by reverbs, echoes and electronics. Against this background – a piano. Flickering , rippling . Cascades of repeating notes and rhythms. As in minimal music . Tonal associations, but with different development. Clear sounds, distorted, appear then re-appear hear and there as whispers and crackles. As in glitch music. But clearly you hear the skills of a seasoned composer – the clear intentions and the feeling for ‘big form’.
Jun 2015Głowicka blending classical, electronic, and minimalist textures offers a rare experimental breath in Polish opera - Sup
The opera opened with an unforgettable image: a split Jackie Kennedy smashing dish after dish while reciting a surreal monologue about baking meringue — a chilling metaphor for a woman sculpted by pop culture into an icon, but silenced in her own story.
In his review, Adam Suprynowicz calls the piece a much-needed experiment for Polish opera. The libretto by Krystian Lada explores Jackie’s internal fracture, torn between public expectations and a vanishing self. Two Jackies appear on stage: the polished First Lady, played with vocal brilliance by Patrycja Krzeszowska-Kubit, and the repressed, rebellious double — Marta Ojrzyńska in a raw, physical performance of silent resistance.
Composer Katarzyna Głowicka weaves together fragments of operatic tradition — from choral lament and vocal stylization to hypnotic minimalism and electronic textures — crafting a layered sound world that echoes Jackie’s unraveling. Though some staging elements fell short and tension wavered in the extended form, the music remained emotionally incisive and sonically daring.
Requiem for an Icon may have been divisive, but it carved open space for new thinking on the opera stage — unsettling, necessary, and unforgettable.
Jun 2015Glowicka skilfully leads the voices and choirs
Katarina Głowicka, author of “Requiem for an icon,” the story of Jackie
Kennedy and the first paparazzo feels well opera form and knows how to lead the soloists through a labyrinth of harmonies, live instruments and electronics.”
DOROTA Kozińska 06.01.2015, Tygodnik PowszechnyDorota Kozinska’s review at Tygodnik Powszechny
Jun 2015Glowicka one of the “compose4you' composers
Glowicka is selected to the new initiative of foundation ‘Donemus’ - Compose4You is an initiative of the Foundation Donemus Management, funded by the Dutch Ministry of Education. http://www.compose4you.nl
Jun 2015Retina featured on CD of Belgian magazine ‘Gonzocircus’
July issue of online and off-line Belgian music magazine ‘Gonzocircus’ will features ‘Retina’ from CD ‘Red Sun’!
Jun 2015Adam Suprynowicz reviews opera 'Requiem for an icon'
“Dwutygodnik” reviews newest opera of Glowicka - “Requiem for an icon”.
Jun 2015'Indulging yourself” - Sound Projector Magazine raves about “Red Sun'
written by Paul Khimasia MorganPosted in Recent arrivals Tagged with ambient, composed, drone, piano “This album is like indulging yourself in a European city break. You dive headlong into the cultural activities you might passively ignore in your own town: museums, galleries, landmarks, theatres, concert halls, all are visited zealously while you studiously refuse to acknowledge the strengths of your own location. Okay, Paris, Vienna or Bruges have far better architecture than Brighton or Bournemouth but let’s not forget that Brighton Museum hosted the first UK exhibition of Don Van Vliet’s paintings and The Russell Cotes museum in Bournemouth has a fantastic collection of Japanese ceramics and a fellow who plays the grand piano in the foyer daily. These are just examples. And then when you do get home, you start noticing all the interesting things about where you live all over again. What I’m getting at is that to me, immersing myself in Red Sun is a bit like temporarily being shown an ideal in contemporary music, and then listening with fresh ears to your other records, environment, home, washing machine and so forth.” “The music in question is meditative, melodic and magisterial, and these beautiful meditations become more strident and forceful as the album progresses. Walentynowicz demonstrates a gentle touch using techniques such as faint delays, lo-fi piano recordings, re-sampling, tasteful dissonance, tone manipulation and drone generation. The first piece, ‘Sun Spot’, starts with an electronic buzz and builds on a three note piano refrain; piano pop like a stop-motion ‘Moments In Love’ by The Art of Noise. Glowicka inserts a well-judged reverse effect at the end. The following piece, ‘Transient’, begins with same electronic buzz and three note piano refrain but then develops the music with field recordings from inside a concrete bunker. ‘Favola’ continues the sonic abstraction of the core elements, this time the piano is played staccato in the high register, while horror film style reverse effects are inlaid.” “The title track heralds a change in mood. The notes becoming discordant and out-of-phase, as if there were two versions of the piece running simultaneously slightly out of time with each other. One piano is close up in the mix, the other distant. Very pleasant, particularly with the aforementioned tasteful dissonance dialled back in. It occurred to me that this track, ‘Red Sun’, could sit very well in the ECM catalogue. Then follows the two longest pieces on the disc, at 14 and 17 minutes respectively. ‘Retina’ begins with the bare essentials. The technique of one piano close up again as in ‘Red Sun’, the second seemingly far away. Glowicka utilises reversed long piano notes to good effect.” more here
May 2015'Requiem for an icon' premiered at National Opera, Warsaw
Opera Requiem for an icon has been premiered at Polish National Opera house, Warsaw. More information here
May 2015'The sound projector' magazine reviews 'Red Sun'
Paul Khimasia Morgan reviews CD “Red Sun”.
“This album is like indulging yourself in a European city break.”
Nov 2014William Anderson reviews 'Kyrie' at ISCM World New Music Days
Katarina Głowicka at ISCM, October 2014 William Anderson’s review of ‘Kyrie’: Katarina Głowicka-her powerful Kyrie made me fight to maintain my composure. Of course this begs the question of why was I in that receptive mode for her and not for others. I admit that I lost it when I started seeing images (in my mind) from Alfons Mucha’s Slovanská epopej(Slav Epic) behind the singers. I had never heard great new Polish music in Poland before, and I was deeply deeply moved by that experience. Also, that her work is a Kyrie. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the Penderecki Mass celebrates the fact that the Soviets could not succeed in eradicating Christianity in Poland. And again, correct me if I’m wrong, but the church is now struggling to keep members? There’s a joke— how to stop people from going to church?— give them an Episcopalian baptism…. This complex history creeps out of the Kyrie, especially when we realize that the words of the Kyrie are boiled down, reduced to phonemes, in Głowicka’s work. Obviously, something was striking from the very beginning, and then she didn’t blow it. It was finely paced. I have no idea why the harmonies and melodies worked so powerfully–3 women sang, along with electronic processing of what they sang. Eastern European composers are not afraid to evoke a religious tone. This is what makes Arvo Part hot and Reich and Glass cool. That is not a value judgement. We like cool jazz, we like hot jazz. Głowicka’s music—was it either? It was primal and that’s hot, I guess. It moved well. It sustained itself. Click here to read the whole review.
Jul 2014'delicious 55 minutes' - Spanish Elena Gomez reviews and broadcasts 'Red Sun'
Spanish online magazine and radio “RTVE” reviews and broadcasts Głowicka’s music in the cycle “Protagonists of piano” . Calls “Red Sun” “…un delicioso disco de 55 minutos “
Here you can find LINK TO REWIEV
Jul 2014German 'Junge Welt' calls Głowicka 'the next star from the East'
RedSun_II_JungeWelt_Jul14Download
Rados Ijedl writes extensive review of “Red Sun” in popular German newspaper “Junge Welt”. Here you can read the review in German:
Jul 2014Gonzo Circus Magazine
Mind the Gap #109 (2014) - compilation from ‘Gonzo Circus” - GC135. Disc compiled and published by Belgian magazine ‘Gonzo Circus’ in July 2014. Track 6 is Retina.
Jun 2014'Impressive' - German magazine Bad Alchemy reviews 'Red Sun'
The issue 5 of magazine “Bad Alchemy” 05/2014, reviews “Red Sun”. You can read it here:
Jun 2014Muzykoteka Szkolna interview on music emigration
On the 10-th anniversary of Poland joining the EU, Polish online magazine “Muzkoteka szkolna” interviews myself and several of my colleagues on music and emigration.
May 2014'Black audio” gives 9 out of 10 to “Red Sun”
Magazine “Black audio” reviews Red Sun with 9 out of 10 points. “Clean and precise, the title track is glorious manifestation of sheer ambient bliss and is formulated as the first proper track that you can grasp onto without the teasing that it’s former counterparts did so well; it’s almost like a gift after all the waiting that has come before….” “For this latest release, Poland’s Kasia Glowicka, is joined by Malgorzata Walentynowicz. Together they weave magic with an ear for spatial awareness and ‘Red Sun’ is a peculiar affair that is surprisingly engaging for all its moments of solitude. More often than not the listener is left with a wall of silence and the real beauty is in the anticipation of ghostly apparitions that glide, reverberated through a misty haze…” Click here to read the article
May 2014Enthusiastic review by German 'Skug' magazine
Curt Cuisine enthusiastically reviews “Red Sun” at German “Skug” magazine.
“.. the purest, most fulfilling works often arise from sources that have nothing in common with their origins.”
Apr 2014'Fascinating' - Gonzo magazine reviews 'Red Sun'
Belgian magazine “Gonzo” calls “Red Sun” fascinating. Arian van Sorge writes in the newest issue, and magazine adds Kasia’s work to their CD “Mind the gap”
To read the review in Dutch, click here: