Coincidence is the title of the album released in 2023 by Paweł Tomaszewski – a composer, pianist and arranger associated with the Polish jazz music scene. The artist included two extended suites on this album – Three Crowns and Coincidence – recorded in collaboration with, among others, musicians from the Szczecin Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Szymon Bywalec. The musicians will present them together with excellent Polish jazz instrumentalists.
The concert will begin with Coincidence – a work directly referring to the 1981 film Przypadek directed by Krzysztof Kieślowski. The main theme of the suite was taken from the soundtrack by Wojciech Kilar, which was used in the film. The premiere of Coincidence took place as part of the fortieth anniversary of the introduction of martial law in Poland in 1981. As the composer emphasises, the greatest inspiration for the creation of his music was the film’s plot perfectly fitting into that period of Poland’s latest history.
Three Crowns, in turn, is a suite for a symphony orchestra, a jazz sextet and a solo voice. Its creation was inspired by the medieval legend of Saint Kinga – a princess who, while fleeing from the Tatars, threw off her crown, and in the place where the crown fell three rocky peaks shot up to block the brutal invaders. To commemorate this miracle, the highest peaks of the Pieniny Mountains were called Three Crowns. According to local accounts, this was indeed an area that provided shelter to the local population during the Mongol invasions. Numerous fragments of the composition contain references to the number three: from individual solutions in rhythmic and melodic layers to the precise selection of instruments in the orchestration.