Authors
ELŻBIETA SIKORA
An artist combining acoustic tradition with electronic modernity; composer of, among others, the opera Madame Curie. Born on 20th October 1943 in Lwów (now Lviv), she graduated in sound engineering from the class of Antoni Karużas at the State Higher School of Music in Warsaw (now the Chopin University of Music). She later studied electroacoustic music with Pierre Schaeffer and François Bayle at the GRM (Groupe de Recherches Musicales) in Paris, and finally composition with Tadeusz Baird and Zbigniew Rudziński in Warsaw.
While still a student, together with Krzysztof Knittel and Wojciech Michniewski, she founded the KEW composers’ group, with which she appeared in Poland, Austria, West Germany, and Sweden. As a French government scholarship holder, she returned to Paris, where she finally settled. She developed her abilities at the IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique) as well as at courses taught by Betsy Jolas, later in California by John Chowning at Stanford University’s CCRMA (Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics). She has conducted courses for composers in Gdańsk, Hamburg, Munich, and Ulm. She has lectured at universities in Angoulême, Marne-la-Vallée, and Chicago. After many years she returned to Warsaw as a visiting professor. In 2011–2017 she was in charge of the Musica Electronica Nova Festival in Wrocław.
Conceived in the spirit of the avant-garde and experimentation, Sikora’s oeuvre is a kind of revision of musical tradition based on new techniques and modern technologies. Two trends coexist in it: electronics and music based on traditional instruments, in which large instrumental (including concertos) and vocal-instrumental forms (such as her four operas) occupy a special place.
In 2013 she was awarded the Prize of the Polish Composers’ Union for outstanding achievements in composition, the opera Madame Curie (whose world premiere had taken place in 2011 at the Grand Auditorium de l’UNESCO in Paris), and for her curatorial work. A year later, she received the title of Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.
Phot. Bartek Barczyk
While still a student, together with Krzysztof Knittel and Wojciech Michniewski, she founded the KEW composers’ group, with which she appeared in Poland, Austria, West Germany, and Sweden. As a French government scholarship holder, she returned to Paris, where she finally settled. She developed her abilities at the IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique) as well as at courses taught by Betsy Jolas, later in California by John Chowning at Stanford University’s CCRMA (Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics). She has conducted courses for composers in Gdańsk, Hamburg, Munich, and Ulm. She has lectured at universities in Angoulême, Marne-la-Vallée, and Chicago. After many years she returned to Warsaw as a visiting professor. In 2011–2017 she was in charge of the Musica Electronica Nova Festival in Wrocław.
Conceived in the spirit of the avant-garde and experimentation, Sikora’s oeuvre is a kind of revision of musical tradition based on new techniques and modern technologies. Two trends coexist in it: electronics and music based on traditional instruments, in which large instrumental (including concertos) and vocal-instrumental forms (such as her four operas) occupy a special place.
In 2013 she was awarded the Prize of the Polish Composers’ Union for outstanding achievements in composition, the opera Madame Curie (whose world premiere had taken place in 2011 at the Grand Auditorium de l’UNESCO in Paris), and for her curatorial work. A year later, she received the title of Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.
Phot. Bartek Barczyk
