This Sunday, September 21, at 5:00 pm, a unique concert will be held at the Concert Hall of the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw, dedicated to Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis – composer, painter and symbolist, one of the greatest visionaries of art at the turn of the 20th century. Admission is free.

The concert within the walls of the Warsaw Music Academy is an event with a special symbolic dimension. This is because it will take place in the place where the Lithuanian artist received his musical education, graduating as a composer in 1899. But that’s not all – Čiurlionis’ works in many shades and interpretations by talented young UMFC musicians will be heard on the eve of the artist’s 150th birthday. The concert will also be the culmination of the Year of Čiurlionis celebrations in Poland.

Program of the concert

The program for Sunday’s concert will include the Nocturne in F sharp minor , Op. 4 No. 1, the Prelude in F sharp major “Angelus Domini,” Fugues inC sharp minor and F sharp minor, the Mazurka in B minor, part of the String Quartet in C minor and a selection of folk songs arranged for mixed choir. The Fryderyk Chopin University Chamber Choir under the baton of Krzysztof Kusiel-Moroz will perform, but also young soloists from the UMFC – pianist Jozef Domzhal, organist Yana Rechkina, harpists Kalina Nowaczek and Maria Lepkowska, and a string quartet composed of Amelia Monko, Ireneusz Szarszaniewicz, Barbara Kucharzyk and Zuzanna Konstantynowicz.

Čiurlionis is a universal artist who combines Poland and Lithuania, tradition and modernity, music and fine arts. His return to the university where he studied as a young artist has a great historical dimension. That’s why we support this event and want his music to be revived by young artists and reach a wide audience again.

– says Robert Piaskowski, director of the National Cultural Center, which is a co-organizer of the event

The meeting of sound and image

Čiurlionis (1875-1911) was a versatile artist: pianist, organist, conductor, as well as painter, poet and thinker. His oeuvre, despite his very short life, includes more than 350 compositions and some 300 paintings, and the remarkable thing is that he treated all fields of art as complementary languages of expression. His music, full of metaphysical tensions, sounded like landscapes painted with sound, and his paintings – as if composed to the rhythm of music.

Čiurlionis’ work is a meeting of sound and image that eluded any boundaries of art. In his fugues and folk songs one can hear the rootedness in tradition, and at the same time an extraordinary imagination that was ahead of its time. He is an artist who shows that music can be not only sound, but also image, poetry and philosophy,” says Dr. Pawel Siechowicz, musicologist and author of a book about the artist.

The artist of two countries

Čiurlionis is an artist of two countries. His “Polish period” began in Warsaw; today’s Polish capital was also close to him linguistically – he spoke fluent Polish, although he always identified himself as Lithuanian. It was in Poland that he became friends with Eugeniusz Morawski. Studying at the School of Fine Arts, he took lessons from Ferdynand Ruszczyc, Konrad Krzyżanowski, Kazimierz Stabrowski, which significantly influenced his work.

Despite his strong ties to Poland, Čiurlionis also remained a great patriot: he led the Lithuanian choir and harmonized folk songs to preserve them in the culture and transfer them to the concert repertoire, and organized the first exhibitions of Lithuanian art.

The Year of Čiurlionis is celebrated not only in Lithuania, but also in many countries around the world – including Poland, Germany, France, Japan and the United States. We invite you to celebrate together.

Details of the concert

Venue: Concert Hall of the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw; 2 Okólnik St.
Date: September 21, 2025 (Sunday).
Time: 5 p.m.

Conducting the concert: Dr. Pawel Siechowicz
Concert program available on the UMFC website

Co-organizers: Fryderyk Chopin University of Music, Lithuanian Institute of Culture, Embassy of the Republic of Lithuania in Poland, National Cultural Center