Dobrawa Czocher

In the organizer's words:

Dreams have long fascinated artists around the world, inspiring them in their creative endeavors. How these fictions of the subconscious can feel both phantasmagorical and real, how they are able to twist, bend and expand time itself, or what relationship they can have to our waking lives, are questions that have inspired artists such as Debussy, Dalí and Kafka. These reflections also served as the starting point for Dobrawa Czocher's debut album, aptly titled DREAMSCAPES. The Polish cellist and composer takes the listener on a journey through the subconscious and explores the mystical richness of reveries with the help of sounds.

At the ripe old age of just 30, Czocher can already look back on a successful musical career. After graduating from two prestigious music academies - the Chopin University of Music in Warsaw and the Hochschule für Musik in Detmold - she became a member of the Junge Deutsche Philharmonie and later solo cellist with the Neue Philharmonie Berlin and soloist with the Szczecin Philharmonic Orchestra. During these demanding years, Czocher acquired a deep understanding of the classical repertoire and made a name for himself as a leading cellist. Together with his good friend and Polish colleague Hania Rani, however, Czocher ventured into composition for the first time. The duo's first joint project, "Biała flaga", was to fundamentally change the musician's perspective.

The last track on DREAMSCAPE, "Epilogue", is the only track on the album that has not been reworked at all. "Epilogue" represents a return to the waking state, a sobriety that lacks the distinct fantasy of dreams, where Czocher uses pizzicato lines on the cello to simply sing the melody. This return to "reality" is not entirely restrained, however; it closes the album with more questions than conclusions. "What happened in a dream, are we still here? Are we still the same people? Did it change us? Where did we go?", provokes Czocher.