Songs
- 1 Mourning the Fading Youth
- 2 Lass, You’re Getting Married
- 3 Afterparty: An Elegy
- 4 Troch szacharda - Karaim Song
- 5 Soframyzda - Karaim Song
Karolina Cicha is one of the most exceptional musicians of her generation. She is a singer, multi-instrumentalist and musical interpreter, and is often compared to the legendary Polish artist Ewa Demarczyk. Cicha plays piano accordion and harpsichord, sings in Yiddish and Esperanto, and effectively merges stage singing with rough rock, jazz, and traditional notes.
On the 2013 album Wieloma językami (9 Languages), co-created with Bart Pałyga, Cicha recalled the musical landscape of her native region, multicultural Podlachia. She tells the stories of its inhabitants in Ukrainian, Belarusian, Lithuanian, Russian, Tartar, Yiddish, and Esperanto. She not only mixed languages, but also sounds: on 9 Languages, samples and loop machines meet exotic instruments: morin khuur, dutar, jew’s harp, duduk, accordion, pipe, mandola, cymbals, and gadulka. One can also hear archaic overtone singing.
Karolina Cicha developed the Jewish theme which first appeared on Wieloma Językami (9 Languages) on her subsequent album JIDYSZLAND (Yiddishland), based on texts by Jewish poets of north-eastern Poland. The poetic copiousness of Yiddish is yet enriched by ethno-jazz compositions co-created with Piotr Domagalski.
( from Culture.pl by A. Legierska)
Her latest album - "Tany" (2020, Kayax) is a dialogue of the past with the present; a dialogue of the old and the new, both textually and musically. These are bipartite compositions made up of traditional songs and a modern commentary.
The album includes compositions in Polish as well as songs in other languages: Belarusian, Ukrainian, Karaim, and others. These are ethnic minorities who inhabit the area of Podlasie in North-East Poland – the home region of Karolina Cicha.
Uplifting texts about important moments and stages of life: birth, wedding, youth, aging, moments of transgression, times of maturing for change, and of encounters with metaphysics. Rituals of transition, rites of passage.
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BREAKING NEWS!
On 26 October, Karolina Cicha's music will become a part of the already existing Karaim on-line map
available at www.mapamuzyczna.karaimi.org.
Karolina Cicha discovers Karaim culture. Her latest project - the Karaim Music Map was created incooperation with the Association of Polish Karaims.
This is the first full music album with traditional Karaim music, so far available only online. In 2021, the album will be officially released.
Karaim music is mostly inspired by Lithuanian and Crimean musical traditions, with some Ukrainian, Russian and Polish influences. Karolina Cicha is a specialist in discovering the sonic and textual richness of minority cultures. She restores the spirit of these old songs, creatively integrating the Karaim oriental tradition with her contemporary sensitivity.