Otton Mieczyslaw Zukowski (1867-1942)
Forward nation!
Where the Polish nation
Song about home, op. 59
Nation's defenders march
Freedom's welcome
To confrere's souls
Earth-mother
And in our place
Let's hum a song
Greeting
On foreign land
Shepherd-orphan
Pale forests
Boy scouts' song
When the dark night falls
Miner's song
Happy day
Mickiewicz, op. 17
To Siberia, op. 9

Aleksander Zukowski (1879-1911)
Mazurka, op. 143
Polonaise, op. 18
Mazurka, op. 15

Beata Koska, mezzo-soprano
Robert Kaczorowski, baryton
Ewa Rytel, piano
Dariusz Micorek, piano
Chœur de chambre Insieme
Monika Bachowska, direction

Otton Mieczyslaw Zukowski spent most of his life in Czerniowce, where he acquired general and musical education. After studies in Lwów and in Vienna, he became a ‘suplent’ in the state-run teachers college in Czerniowce. Between 1906 and 1911 he was a Polish teacher: initially in the teachers college, and later in a state-run secondary school. His works, vocal as well as instrumental, in addition to quite numerous transcriptions of his own and other composers’ songs for different scorings, had as their source Zukowski’s strong convictions which could be expressed in the two following words: patriotism and faith. Therefore Otton Mieczyslaw sacrificed his artistic achievements on the altar of the fight for free and independent Poland, for the place of Polish in the public life, for the historical awareness of the Poles and for the respect for the beliefs of the fathers and the Catholic faith.