Jury
13th International Competition of Contemporary Chamber Music:

Jan Pilch (chairman) 
Jan Pilch - (born in 1956) completed his studies at the Kraków's Academy of Music with distinetions, in the percussion elass under the supervision of J. Stójko. As a soloist and performer of chamber music, he has participated many times in the most important Polish contemporary musie festivals (Warsaw Autumn Festival, Poznań Spring Festival, Musica Polonica Nova-Wrocław, Audio - Art - Kraków, Stuttgart), as well as in festivals in Dresden, Nuremberg (Musik des XX Jahrhunderts), Salzburg (Aspekte), Amsterdam, Berlin (lnventionen), Munich, Moscow, Kyoto, Sendai, and Tokyo. He received the Polihymnia Medal during the Poznań Music Spring in 1980 for the interpretation of ariants by K. Moszumańska - Nazar. Pilch is a founder and member of the Kraków Percussion Group, Muzyka Centrum Artists' Association and Mr. Bober's Friends Group. He used to be a member of the Laboratorium jazz group and the Crossover International trio. He has cooperated with the MW2 group, Kraków Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra, Giovanile Orchestra in Lanciano (Italy), Factory Opera in Zurich, Chamber Orchestra in Basil, as well as the Cats musical. He has made a number of radio and CD recordings with contemporary and jazz music, as well as he was the first performer of pieces by such composers as K. Moszumańska-Nazar, B. Schaeffer, H. Kulenty, and R. Szeremeta. He has conducted classes at international courses of contemporary music, among others, in Stuttgart, Schwaz, Kazimierz nad Wisłą, Radziejowice, and Kraków. In the years 1994-1996, he performed as a soloist in Orquesta Filarmonica de Grań Canaria. Sińce 1982 he has been a lecturer at the Academy of Music in Kraków. Until now, he has educated over 25 graduates, the majority of whom are active jazz and classical music performers. In 2002, he obtained the title of a Professor of Music Arts.
 
 

Elena Braslavsky

Ms. Braslavsky began piano lessons at the age of five in Moscow, USSR.  In 1979 she graduated Summa Cum Laude from the Gnesin School of Music.  After emigrating with her family to the United States, she continued her studies at the Juilliard School with Leonard Eisner, Nadia Reisenberg, and Oxana Yablonskaya until receiving her Doctoral Degree in 1991.  She also studied at the Staatlische Hochschüle for Music in Cologne, Germany, as a Fulbright - DAAD scholar and at the European Mozart Academy in Prague.
Pianist Elena Braslavsky has distinguished herself both as a soloist and chamber musician.  Her appearances include concerts at the Weill Hall at Carnegie Hall, Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center in New York, Théâtre des Champs Elysées in Paris, Berlin Philharmonic, Izumi Hall in Osaka, Melba Hall in Melbourne, Rudolfinum Hall in Prague, Tonhalle in Düsseldorf and Festival La Fenici in Venice. She has performed with musicians including Nobuko Imai, Steven Isserlis, and also appeared as a soloist in the German première of a composition "Alleluia" by Sofia Gubaidulina conducted by Mstislav Rostropovich.She has performed as a soloist with orchestras including the New Jersey Symphony, the Salzburg Chamber Soloists, the Cracow Philharmonic, the Warsaw Camerata, the North Czech Philharmonic, and the Prague Philharmonia. She is currently on the faculty of the University Mozarteum in Salzburg.

Tadeusz Wielecki 
Tadeusz Wielecki, a composer and bassist, in 1954 in Warsaw, studied double bass with Alfred Wieczorek and Andrzej Mysinski and composition with Wlodzimierz Kotonski at the Warsaw Academy of Music. In 1986, he was a Witold Lutoslawski scholar. As a bassist, Wielecki performs contemporary solo works, giving concerts in a number of European countries, Azerbaijan, and the United States. He has also been involved in the promotion of contemporary music and artistic education, leading programs on the new music for children and youth in the Polish Radio. In 1992 Wielecki chaired the Artistic Committee of the World's Music Days of the International Society of Contemporary Music  (ISCM) in Warsaw. In 1999, at the UNESCO's International Composers' Tribune in Paris, his CONCERTO A REBOURS for violin and orchestra (1998) was listed among the recommended works. Since 1999, Tadeusz Wielecki has been the director the Warsaw Autumn International Festival of Contemporary Music.
Wielecki is one of the most interesting Polish composers of the middle-aged generation. On the one hand, his attitude to composing is marked by emotional expressiveness. On the other hand, his approach to the process of composing is highly intellectual. A number of his works reveal intellectual experimenting. It goes without saying that Wielecki's compositions are influenced by his experience as a bassist. Wielecki is particularly interested in modifying the traditional technique of playing stringed instruments. In his 1998 CONCERTO A REBOURS for violin and orchestra, the composer develops a special method of playing that could be referred to as "sliding". It consists of continuous movement, fingers sliding along the strings, as opposed to the traditional technique where fingers are statically placed on the fingerboard of the instrument. According to the composer, this technical innovation has musical consequence as it impacts the sound of music.
 
Paul Patterson
Paul Patterson (born in 1947) is one of the most prominent composers of his generation. He studied trombone and composition at the Royal Academy of Musie and after years, in 1997, when he became the Manson Professor of Composition, he returned to his alma mater to become the Head of the Contemporary Musie Composition Department. He has also worked with the South East Arts, the University of Warwick and the London Sinfonietta. His compositions reveal a preoecupation with unusual combinations of sounds and rhythm. Stravinsky and Hindemith were his early influences, then the Polish school of Penderecki and Lutoslawski, and more recently, a 20th century English chorał tradition. In his latest phase of his career, he seems to have found a language that is equally complex and attractive for the public. Patterson is a faithful advocate of contemporary musie and in 1996 he was honoured with the PRS/RPS Leslie Boosley Award.
His recent works include Gloria composed for the Saddleworth Festival, the Millenium Mass for the Southwell Cathedral and the Orchestra of St.  John's Smith Square (performed many times both in the UK and abroad), and a string octet, Deviations, recently premiered at the Contemporary Musie Festival in Manchester by the Goldberg Ensemble. Paul Patterson's most recent works include the Cello Concerto for Raphel Wallfisch and Jubilee Dacers, a work celebrating the 5Oth anniversary of the BBC Concert Orchestra and a new version of The Three Little Pigs, which has been commissioned by the Basel Symphony Orchestra.
 

Marta Ptaszyńska
Marta Ptaszyńska is an internationally acclaimed composer, born in Warsaw, Poland, and since 1972 living in the United States. She worked with Witold Lutoslawski, Nadia Boulanger and Olivier Messiaen. She is the author of such well-known works as the Concerto for Marimba, Winter's Tale, Sonnets to Orpheus, and Moon Flowers, as well as numerous composition for percussion (Siderals, Graffito, Spider Walk, Space Model. Ptaszynska has received commissions from orchestras including Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Cincinna¬ti Symphony, Polish Chamber Orchestra, W. Lutoslawski's Symphony Orchestra and Sinfo¬nia Varsovia, from artists such as Ewa Podleś, Keiko Abe, Evelyn Glennie. Marta Ptaszynska has been honored with many prizes and awards, including the 2006 Benjamin H. Danks Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Alfred Jurzykowski Award in New York, ASCAP Awards, the Award at the International Rostrum of Composers at the UNE¬SCO in Paris, etc. In 1995, she received the "Officer Cross of Merit" of the Republic of Po¬land. Her music has been performed at prestigious international festivals, including ISCM World Music Days, the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, the Salzburg Festival, the Warsaw Autumn International Festival, the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, the Gul¬benkian Foundation and many others. Artist taught on the most important universities in USA. In 1998, Ptaszynska was appointed a Professor of Music and Humanities at the University of Chicago. In 2005, she received the title of the Helen & Frank Sul¬zberger Professor of Composition. In 1965-70, Ptaszynska was the president of the Circle of Young Composers of the Union of Polish Composers in Poland. a member of the Board of Directors of the Percussive Arts Society (PAS) in the U.S., co-founded and for several years was vice president of the American Society of Polish Music in New York. Currently she is a member of ASCAP, the Percussive Arts Society, and the Polish Music Reference Center in Los Angeles, and serves on the board of the International Alliance of Women Composers.

Christine Michaela Pryn
Christine Pryn started piano lessons at the age of five, and when she was nine, she changed to the violin. One year later she appeared for the first time on the Danish Radio and since then, numerous of her concerts has been broadcasted. In 1992 she was admitted to the Royal Danish Academy of Music and afterwards she continued her education at the Carl Nielsen Academy of Music and at Folkwang-Hochschule Essen with Prof.  Adolphe Mandeau   (Carl Flesch student). Furthermore she has participated in masterclasses with Christian Tetzlaff, Leon Spierer, Cho-Liang Lin, Paavo Pohjola, and Rainer Kussmaul. Christine Pryn is particularly interested in 20th century music and contemporary music, and she has been supervised by some of the world's leading composers of today like Gunther Schuller, Krzysztof Penderecki, Luciano Berio, Einojuhani Rautavaara.  

Christine Pryn has appeared as a soloist with orchestras throughout Denmark and abroad, including for example the Copenhagen Philharmonic Orchestra, the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra, the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Amadeus Chamber Orchestra of Polish Radio, and she has been collaborating with conductors like Jan Krenz. Furthermore she has premiered and recorded Raymond Deane 's violin concerto written especially for her with the National Irish Symphony Orchestra. 

Still only being 32, Christine Pryn has given more than 80 first performances, and appeared at prestigious festivals such as the Warsaw Autumn Festival, the Summer Festival in Tivoli Concert Hall, the Szymanowki Festival held in the composer's residence in Zakopane, and the Grieg festival "Troldhaugen Concerts" in Bergen. Furthermore Christine Pryn 's quartet Ensemble Nordlys was chosen to represent Denmark at the international EU Music Festival in Warsaw Philharmonic Hall, and as the only chamber ensemble they will take part in the worldwide celebration of the 200th anniversary of Hans Christian Andersen . Her recording of Szymanowski's Mythes was chosen as "Critic's Choice 2003" by American Record Guide. 

In 1999 Christine Pryn won the "Swedish Young Soloists' Competition", playing with the Helsingborg Symphony Orchestra, and since then she has been awarded several prestigious prizes including the Danish Music Reviewers' Prize.
 

Paweł Mykietyn
Paweł Mykietyn composer and clarinetist. In 1997, he graduated from the Frederic Chopin Academy of Music where he studied in the class of prof. Włodzimierz Kotoński. At the age of 22, he made his debut at the Warsaw Autumn Festival with composition titled "La Strada". In 1995, his composition "3 for 15" - commissioned by the Polish Radio - received the first prize at the International Rostrum of Composers at the UNE¬SCO in Paris in the category of young composers, and in 1996 his composition "Epifora" - commissioned by the Experimental Studio of the Polish Radio - received the prize at the 4th International Rostrum of Electroacoustic Music at the UNE¬SCO in Amsterdam, in the category of young composers. He has composed music at the commission of the Grand Theatre, National Opera and for the following ensembles: the Belca Quartet, de Ereprijs, Icebreaker and Kronos Quartet. In January 2000, he received a "Polityka Weekly" "Passport. In the same month, his composition "3 for 13" was presented at Midem Classique in Cannes. In 2002, he received the Silesian Cultural Award of the Lower Saxony Land, and in 2008 he became the first laureate of "OPUS" Public Media Award. He has composed for such soloists as Elżbieta Chojnacka, Ewa Pobłocka and Andrzej Bauer. He has cooperated with distinguished conductors, including Jean-Paul Dessy, Jacek Kasprzyki, Jerzy Maksymilian, Diego Masson, Wojciech Michniewski and Reinbert de Leeuw. Starting with 1996, he has composed music to most of theatrical performance of Krzysztof Warlikowski. He has also cooperated with Grzegorz Jarzyna, Paweł Łysak and Andrzej Woron. Since 2008, he has been running a musical stage in the Nowy Theatre in Warsaw. He is the author of music to such films as Ono, 33 sceny z życia by Małgorzata Szumowska, Egoiści by Mariusz Treliński and Tatarak by Andrzej Wajda, for which he received the prize during the Festivals of Polish Feature Films in Gdynia.