From a tribute to Moondog by the French Cabaret Contemporain, to the immersion in drone vibrations at the Museum of Municipal Engineering — in this way the third evening closes the first half of the Sacrum Profanum Festival.

We started the Festival Thursday in the early afternoon by a series of meetings and discussions with artists. In Cricoteka, the Irish composer Jennifer Walshe explained why ”everything is important” and why one of the best diagnoses of the reality which surrounds us is a ” dark euphoria”. Then Adriana Borowska, Frédéric Blondy and Antoni Michnik led us through minimalism understood as a plethora of various trends in music. Finally, Filip Florian, a Romanian writer-journalist, explained the context of his newest book The Days of the King, in this way closing the literary part of the Festival.

In the evening, the Paris-based quintet Cabaret Contemporain together with two Swedish vocalists Linda Olah and Isabel Sörling presented their own interpretation of the legacy left by the Viking of the 6th Avenue. Perfectly harmonized voices, combined with the dynamic, metallic sound of the percussion and electronics, made Moondog’s pieces sound very topical. The musicians surprised us with a multitude of ways of handling the percussion (at one time various objects were thrown at the drums) and with the contrabass (struck with the drumsticks). Some pieces were particularly conspicuous -- the collages, sweetly noisy Paris and Why Spend The Dark Night With You, tugging at the audience’s heartstrings. At the end we had the pleasure to listen to a disco version of Moondog, which should be treated as a strong stress on how the American composer influenced every music genre.

In the second part of Tribute to Moondog, Raphael Rogiński, Natalia Przybysz and the Slovenian avant-garde folk ensemble Širom took the stage. The percussion, the violin, vocals, two guitars and a number of not-quite-obvious instruments joined their forces in slightly experimental, blues arrangements. The musical pieces many of us know very well: Nature boy and Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child bid the perfect festival farewell to the American musical ”outcast”.

From Cricoteka we teleported to the Museum of Municipal Engineering, where l’Orchestre de Nouvelles Créations, Expérimentations et Improvisation Musicales (ONCEIM), consisting of an impressive number of more than 30 instrumentalists, already awaited us. The meeting with one-sound music, known as drone, began from Occam Océan, an hour long composition by the French composer Éliane Radigue. So smoothly that almost imperceptibly the strings introduced us into the composition. In a moment wind instruments took over. Than percussion joined in… The musicians made a perfect synthesis passing the ”single sound” from one instrument to another. Undoubtedly, this required great self-discipline and self-restraint from musicians. Just as they lightly introduced us to the sound, they left it in the same way. But silence did not last long, because soon Oren Ambarchi and Stephen O’Malley, known from the American experimental metal ensemble Sunn O))) took over the stage (or in fact appeared in front of it) with their guitars. The composition of the canonical composer Alvin Lucier: I Am Sitting in a Room — should be called ”a situation” or “the resonant moment of pause”, just as in fact the entire first part of the concert, quite unusual in our overstimulated world.

South Pole by Iancu Dumitrescu performed after the intermission was a true noise pill. We could sense its physical effects in a few seconds. The two above-mentioned guitarists, the conductor Ilan Volkov and two percussionists , installed in quite unusual laces in the room soon reminded us that sound can easily turn into a weapon. The aggressive, distorted guitar sounds, noisy squeals, distant echoes of explosions, alternated with moments of peace from time to time, kept the audience in constant suspense…The fear of a sudden loud sound attack grew. This piece which lasted 15 minutes probably led us closer to the ”Zone of Discomfort” – the leading theme of this year’s festival edition.

Gruidés, a composition dating to 2015, was a certain combination of earlier performed very different compositions in terms of dynamics. The drone in Stephen O’Malley’s version was broken by the strong sound of drums, rattling and rapidly growing density of sound of the orchestral combinations. Thanks to this, the audience having survived the earlier musical challenge, could smoothly go back to the normal and prepare itself to more sound surprises in the days to come.

Today at Sacrum Profanum:

Eastman / East Men – Ludowy Theatre – 7.00 pm

Essence – Łaźnia Nowa Theatre – 9.00 pm