Kaczyńska, Olivia International Festival of Contemporary Music Warsaw Autumn

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is a choral conductor and music educator. She graduated from  the Faculty of Music Education at the Chopin Academy of Music  in Warsaw, specialising in the direction of vocal and vocalinstrumental ensembles. She continued her training at the Carl  Orff Music Education Centre in Warsaw and at Kodály seminars  in Poland and Hungary. She formerly taught music subjects in  the Faculty of Humanities at the Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw. Since 2006 she has worked as a choral conductor at the John Paul II Primary School in Łazy. Until August 2026  she also taught music there and led musicianship classes based  on the Kodály and Orff approaches. She completed a doctorate  under the supervision of Agnieszka Franków-Żelazny at the Karol  Lipiński Academy of Music in Wrocław, where she now teaches. She has cooperated with the Institute of Art of the Polish Academy of Sciences on publications devoted to folk music. She  devised the educational programme Muzyka źródeł (Folk Music  Roots) and coauthored the music textbook Nuty, smyki i patyki.  With Alicja Szeluga, she prepared two volumes of the choral songbook Śpiewajmy! (Let’s Sing!), intended respectively for one- and  two-part equal-voice choirs and published by the National Forum  of Music. She subsequently worked with Izabela PolakowskaRybska on Śpiewajmy przez cały rok (Let’s Sing All Year Round),  available online through the Singing Polonia programme.

An exceptionally active choral conductor, Kaczyńska founded  and directs the Animato Children’s Choir at John Paul II Primary  School in Łazy, with which she takes part in the Singing Poland  choral educational programme. The choir has won numerous  competition prizes and performed at Warsaw Philharmonic in  2016 and 2018, Łódź Philharmonic in 2017, and National Forum  of Music in 2016 and 2018.

At the same school she also directs the younger Primus Children’s Choir, which prepares the youngest pupils for their eventual progression to Animato. Since 2022 Primus has repeatedly  received Gold Band distinctions in Singing Poland competitions.  For many years Kaczyńska has also conducted the Effatha Choir  at St Stephen’s Parish in Raszyn. 

Her other cooperations have included the Canto mixed choir  and the Passionate Chamber Vocal Ensemble at the Piastów  Municipal Cultural Centre; the Dominanta Children’s Choir at  the Natolin Cultural Centre in Warsaw; the Sempre Youth Choir  and Mrokowiacy Senior Choir at the Lesznowola Community  Cultural Centre.

As an arts facilitator, she organises concerts, leads numerous  workshops for choirs, conductors and teachers, and advocates  for the arts. In 2018 she received the Minister of National Education Award.