Female composers occupy and important and visible place in Poland’s contemporary musical culture, which they co-create thanks to their versatile activity (creative, organisational, didactic). They include Katarzyna Kwiecień-Długosz (b. 1978), a composer from Zielona Góra with a substantial oeuvre (67 works), who for some time has devoted herself to carillon music (e.g. Epitafium for Paweł Adamowicz). Kwiecień-Długosz has an excellent compositional technique and is a master of the form, the structure of which is based on a fluctuation of tensions and releases easily discernible to the listeners. For eighteen years composing has been a piece of artistic reportage from her life, which is signalled in three scenes from her oeuvre. The first—Inclinations — suggests the artist’s predilection for some musical-technical issues (including “translating” techniques, e.g. Memories from VN for cello and piano). The second — Reflections — presents the therapeutic objective of the composed music, seemingly defined in the titles and the author’s commentary, but opening itself up to the listener in a very emotional layer (e.g. Punctum for string orchestra). The third — Understatements — reveals the composer’s introvert and contemplative nature (e.g. Ad fontes for carillon). Katarzyna Kwiecień-Długosz is the initiator and organiser of a series of chamber academic concerts presenting the oeuvres of artists from the University of Zielona Góra, Poznań Academy of Music and Szczecin Academy of Art. She includes her students from the University of Zielona Góra in this type of activity, thus safeguarding further development of the musical culture.
