Friday 06.11.2026 || 18:00
Kraków - Cricotecta
Please, sit comfortably or lie down. Close your eyes and switch off. The first Ritual will start with barely audible music and end with the sound of an instrument that may never have existed.
In the first Ritual, we bring together two instruments which did not exist until recently. Eneasz Kubit is the inventor of Poland’s first quarter-tone accordion, which also allows one to play notes between semitones. Lukas de Clerck has designed a telescopic aulos – a modern-day interpretation of the ancient instrument that fell out of use over a thousand years ago. One builds on what is already known; the other is pieced together from fragments of knowledge about the past. Both open up the music to microtones, resonances and unconventional timbres.
We will start in complete darkness with the world premiere of Please, sit comfortably or lie down. Close your eyes and switch off. You can fall asleep, everything will be fine. by Artur Zagajewski. The piece will remain very quiet throughout the entire performance. The accordion will be amplified at close range – not to make it sound powerful, but to bring the audience closer to the slightest vibrations, murmurs and sounds from both sides of the instrument. Take the title literally – sit or lie down, close your eyes, switch off, or fall asleep. Everything will be fine.
Jakub Ziółkowski’s intervention will lead us out of the darkness – it will be followed by an acoustic piece on the telescopic aulos. For years, De Clerck played on reconstructed historical instruments and made his own reeds, until he decided to free the aulos from the duty to faithfully recreate the past. His instrument has no finger holes, and the pitch of the two pipes sounding simultaneously is adjusted by extending them. The reeds behave like two oscillators, producing microtonal friction, rumblings and dense drones. In Kraków, de Clerck will perform tracks from The Telescopic Aulos of Atlas and present some brand new pieces.
The first Ritual does not lead us from the present into antiquity. It brings together two modern inventions and two ways of delving deeper into sound to play music that was never heard before.
The Ritual concert series
The Ritual is the main concert programme of this year’s edition of the festival. Every day, we bring together artists presenting their own version of the Ritual. They will draw on forgotten cultures and fading traditions, creating fantastical ethnographies and contemporary forms that may send audiences into a state of trance. We will hear music from all corners of the globe – ranging from reconstructions of Greater Poland folk music, through Algonquin songs and Indian ragas, to Japanese performance art and a contemporary instrument based on the ancient Greek aulos.
The Ritual starts when you cross the threshold. Step inside the installation by Si On and Jakub Ziółkowski – a world of painted fabrics and humanoid figures, reminiscent of a ritual tent. It is a space established to allow you to experience the sacred time of the festival. It is also a space straddling the line between art and ritual, in which the audience will be seated around a central stage. Every day, the two performances will be linked by a musical and ritual intervention by Ziółkowski, who will take on the role of master of ceremonies for the duration of the concerts. The performers and the music may change, but all parts of the Ritual will follow the same, uninterrupted sequence.
Artur Zagajewski – Please, sit comfortably or lie down. Close your eyes and switch off. You can fall asleep, everything will be fine. for solo quarter-tone accordion (2026) 30’ (world premiere)
Eneasz Kubit – amplified quarter-tone accordion
Jakub Ziółkowski – ritual intervention, 10’
Lukas de Clerck – The Telescopic Aulos of Atlas (2024) 30’
Lukas de Clerck – telescopic aulos