Widlarz, Agnieszka
A eurhythmics and piano-improvisation teacher, composer of children’s songs, and Doctor of Musical Arts, she graduated from the Eurhythmics Section of the Department of Music Education at the Chopin Academy of Music in Warsaw, where she studied improvisation with Szabolcs Esztényi. She has taught at the Chopin University of Music since 2003. She also works with children and teenagers at the Karol Szymanowski State Music School Complex no. 4 in Warsaw. She conducts piano improvisation workshops for music school pupils and teachers and contributes to general music education projects. Her research focuses particularly on the history of the Dalcroze method and its reception in Poland.
As a songwriter, she has worked with the publishers Żak, Edukacja Polska, PWN, and WSiP. Her songs, alongside works by Krzysztof Herdzin, appear on the album Mazurka (2010), recorded by leading Polish jazz vocalists Mieczysław Szcześniak, Do ro ta Miśkiewicz, Janusz Szrom, and Agnieszka Wilczyńska. She also arranged songs for Voice Band and Anita Lipnicka’s debut album Seventh Heaven (2012). In 2018, under the Composing Commissions programme, she wrote twelve miniatures for children’s voices and instruments. Her collection of songs to words by Anna Kierkosz, What Do Sounds Play? appeared in print in 2019. In 2007, a jury chaired by Krzysztof Knittel awarded her the 1st and 2nd Prize in the Music is for Everyone Foundation’s composition competition for a children’s lullaby. For her outstanding contribution to arts education in Poland, she received the Individual Award of the Director of the Centre for Artistic Education in 2016 and 2019, and a Diploma of the Minister of Culture and National Heritage in 2018.
Selected works: In Łazienki Park, five miniatures for voices and instruments from the album Mazurka (2010), What Do Sounds Play?, collection of children’s songs (2018), Meloharmoidiochordophone for six hands on a prepared piano (2022), Between the Lines, participatory improvisation for voices (2022), Stringovoices (2022), Talking of Colours, vocal numbers for a binaural opera (2024).