Instrumental music, predominantly secular, was a cultural treasure of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Wrocław Baroque Ensemble will remind us of this by presenting a programme in the Old Refectory that they have not yet recorded in a studio. The performance will include works written for instruments and instrumental interpretations of vocal works, entirely legitimate given the performance practice of the era.

The works of the featured composers active in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth   can be experienced in the undoubtedly fleeting context of concerts. This is due to the fact that, throughout Poland’s stormy history,  but a few secular works – absent from the collections of churches or monasteries – have survived to this day. Perhaps that is why they are usually performed with reverence. Yet the playing of early music allows musicians much more freedom than compositions from the Classical period. Often, the choice of instruments and the shaping of parts within a general melodic and rhythmic framework, according to specific rules, depend on the artists. Wrocław Baroque Ensemble takes a more relaxed approach to historical works, presenting these works in a new light and extracting previously unheard aesthetic qualities from them, as if colouring a black-and-white engraving.

The concert programme will feature works by Adam Jarzębski. From the famous collection Canzoni e concerti by Sigismund III Vasa’s favorite musician, the selected compositions include both his own and those travestied, that is, based on existing works (a common practice at the time). Contrasting these will be two examples from the legacy of Jacek Różycki, an artist active during the High Baroque period. His four-part hymns, composed for the singers of the Sigismund Chapel at Wawel Castle, will be performed in instrumental versions. Also featured will be a composition by Mikołaj Zieleński, author of a collection of offertories (music intended for the offering of gifts during Holy Mass) and communions for the entire year, published in Venice. The ensemble will perform his Video caelos apertos – communion for the day of St Stephen.

The WBE musicians also draw on works by lesser-known names. Only two compositions remain from Andrzej Rohaczewski, a composer working in the service of Albrecht Stanisław Radziwiłł in the first half of the 17th century. Equally limited is the known legacy of Marcin Gremboszewski, a Gdańsk virtuoso of the zinc, living at the same time – ​​this interesting instrument will appear on stage this evening. And how did the Germans listen to the music of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth? The answer to this question lies in the Polish dances arranged and composed by Valentin Haussmann, which trace his travels through Royal Prussia in the early 17th century.