The year 2019 sees the 200th anniversary of the birth of Stanisław Moniuszko, premier composer, conductor, organ player, educator, director of Warsaw’s Teatr Wielki, and the father of Polish opera. Embracing operas, art songs, cantatas, religious music, symphonic works, chamber and solo pieces, operettas, ballets, and theatre music, his oeuvre impresses with its diversity, melodic richness, and deeply-rooted connection with the Polish music heritage. His operas and art songs are the core of Polish vocal literature and often the linchpin of the repertoires of Poland’s greatest singers.

Programme:
Stanisław Moniuszko – Flis (opera in I act)

Artists:
Mariusz Smolij - conductor
Toruń Symphony Orchestra
Choir of raftsmen
Adam Zaremba
Krystyna Nowak 
Szymon Rona  
Marcin Skibiński  
Wojciech Dyngosz 
Janusz Lewandowski
Aleksandra Pliszka

libretto - Stanisław Bogusławski

Szymon Rona is an acclaimed young tenor soloist, born in Bydgoszcz (Poland) in 1987. He is a graduate of the Feliks Nowowiejski Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz, where he was a student in Prof. Hanna Michalak’s class, in the Faculty of Vocal Music and Drama. He obtained his master degree in 2014 and the same year he also became a soloist of the Bydgoszcz Opera Nova, where he has already sung over twenty opera parts, among them the parts of Nemorino in Gaetano Dionizetti’s The Love Potion, Count Almaviva in Gioachino Rossini’s The Barber of Seville, or Prince Tamino in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s The Magic Flute. Szymon boasts a rich repertoire that includes oratorio-cantata music as well as operetta parts. He collaborates with the Poznań Opera House, the Pomeranian Philharmonic Hall in Bydgoszcz, the Feliks Nowowiejski Philharmonic Hall in Olsztyn, the Polish Philharmonic Hall Sinfonia Baltica in Słupsk, and the Jan Kiepura Mazovian Operetta Theatre in Warsaw. In 2011-2012 Szymon was awarded distinctions in the International Vocal Competition ‘Golden Voices’ in Warsaw, and in 2011-2013 he was among the recipients of scholarships given by the Minister of Culture and National Heritage and the Minister of Science and Higher Education.

Marcin Skibinski - He began his music education at the age of 14. He attended the Ignacy Jan Paderewski Secondary School of Music in Chelm. Then he studied opera singing at the Feliks Nowowiejski Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz, in the Faculty of Vocal Music and Drama. He graduated from the Academy with the degree of Bachelor of Music in 2018. He is the winner of the International Vocal Competition in Siauliai (Lithuania) (2nd Prize, 2014). He has participated in the Vocal Competition for Tenors, organised by the Polish Philharmonic Hall in Slupsk (2018). He has participated in several performances, such The Opera Ball, composed by Richard Heuberger (the part of George, 2016), The Gipsy Princess, composed by Imre Kalman (the part of Edwin, 2017), The New Don Kichot, composed by Stanislaw Moniuszko (the part of Karol, 2018). He also sang the tenor part in Mozart’s Requiem in D Minor with the Bydgoszcz Military Orchestra (2018).