FINAL CONCERT

Gong! With this sound, Andrzej Zarych, the director of MCK SOKÓŁ, opens the door of this year’s last concert of the FESTIVAL OF THE CHILDREN OF MOUNTAINS. And through the wide-open time of the final concert, the Costa Rican girls enter, introduced by a flute. They are looking in different directions, sometimes responding with movement to the music, finally appearing to find one another. TOGETHER they are leaving the stage.

A stronger rhythm produced mainly by the Colombian drum, and a Colombian boy pulling the ship that we know so well from their national day. Something is different though. This time, representatives of each ensemble are arriving “on board”. A vessel of unity. In front of us appears a group of ten persons, united by a sign of light: lanterns in their hands.

“Siskin, siskin”... and the little bird can show: how they sow smiles, how friendship grows, how they reap love. Every call is at the same time an invitation to the representatives of another ensemble, the children and the instructors...

The first group dances a polka, the second one - góralski, the third one - to the strains of a Hungarian melody, and they all get together. They entered the stage separately, but are leaving together.

And two more groups of singing girls get on the stage from the side of the audience, as if they were also bringing us, the observers, into this reality of unity.


Patryk Rutkowski, the Festival concert director, goes over this year’s watchwords: “GOODNESS is a SMILE, FRIENDSHIP, LOVE, folklore, comradeship. Goodness can be shared. “Hoś! Hoś!”

And Krzysztof Trebunia-Tutka responds with the Podhale-style “Hehehehej!”

Patryk continues: “Goodness is nature, sunshine, but also little birds and our little Lach cuckoo.”

And the “little cuckoo' is also one of the Festival watchwords. It gets the Lach musical band started, and summons representatives of all the ensembles (the children as well as the instructors) to the stage in a multicoloured parade, with the nameboards and the national flags... A beautiful image that in a bridge-like manner refers to the moment when they were standing in the same way in the Old Market Square just six days ago... Just...

The emcees greet the distinguished guests:  Patryk Wicher, a Polish MP; Marcin Skrzecz, Magdalena Trzaska and Martyna Niewiadomska, representatives of the National Institute of Rural Culture and Heritage; Dariusz Gawęda (and his wife), the deputy director of the Department of Culture and National Heritage, representing the Governor of the Małopolska Province; Katarzyna Antosz, the deputy director of the Department of Monitoring and Implementation of European Funds; Franciszek Kantor, a member of the management board of the Nowy Sącz County; Magdalena Majka, the deputy mayor of the town of Nowy Sącz; Rev. Dr Stanisław Kowalik, the Festival chaplain; members of the Festival's Artistic Committee: Dr Dorota Majerczyk, the chairwoman; Dr hab. Tomasz Nowak, Dr Evgenia Grancharova, Benedykt Kafel, Dr Dusittorn Ngamying, and Laura Viviana López Cristancho; Dr Maria Szymańska-Ilnata, the president of the Polish Seminar of Ethnomusicology; Agata Zięba, a Limanowa County councillor and president of the Kamienica branch of the Podhale Inhabitants Association; Michał Murzyn, the director of the Tatra Museum; Benedykt Polański, the director of the Municipal Cultural Centre in Nowy Sącz; Anna Chowaniec-Stasińska, a.k.a. Hanna Rybka, the artistic director of the International Festival of Highland Folklore in Zakopane; Łukasz Przybyłowicz, a representative of ‘Karpatia’ Cooperative Bank of Highlands; Andrzej Zarych, the Festival director; Piotr Gąsienica, the deputy director and organisation manager of the Festival; Liliana Olech, the deputy director responsible for professional arts at the SOKÓŁ Małopolska Cultural Centre; Mirosław Turek, the chief accountant at MCK SOKÓŁ; and representatives of TVP3 Kraków.

The most distinguished guests are invited on stage. They are the ones who present the ensembles with the fluffy lambs, Festival photos and hearts, and sweets.

Andrzej Zarych encourages applause for the emcees: Krzysztof Trebunia-Tutka and Patryk Rutkowski, who also acts as the director of the Festival shows. He also extends thanks to Piotr Gąsienica, who oversaw the whole thing. And the whole thing means work done by, among others, 120 persons, the MCK SOKÓŁ staff and volunteers. The director general also expressed his belief that for the children, Nowy Sącz will be the most beautiful place in the world, once they take goodness with them. Our goodness.

Handing over of the shepherd's cane! A solemn moment expressive of the fact that the Festival never ends. The MAŁE NISKOWIOKI ensemble hand over their power to MALI MYSTKOWIANIE, the host ensemble of the 32nd FESTIVAL OF THE CHILDREN OF MOUNTAINS. The new host vowed “to make it as beautiful as you did.”

And as usual, the cuckoo brings everyone off the stage. However, that is not the end of the thanks. Another round of applause is for Monika Kurzeja, the coordinator of the organisational office; Małgorzata Mikulska, the coordinator of the foreign ensembles; and the organisational office composed of Paulina Gaweł, Edyta Giza, and Małgorzata Haza. Patryk Rutkowski extends special thanks to his assistants, his “right and left aunties,” namely Ewa Banaś and Dominika Szołdrowska. Finally, we applaud those who worked on this Festival pro bono (there's that goodness again!), and so the stage welcomes volunteers. And then there are the ensemble guides. And then... No. Now we are moving on to the very essence of the evening.
 

Successive national days present themselves to us. The children dance comrade dances and their own national ones, and there are some who have danced all the dances after the comrade fashion. This is the kind of thing we could keep writing forever about, and nothing would probably come of it. Because COMRADESHIP simply has to be seen. Those who didn't make it this year - be sure to come next year! At least once in your life!


And then again, all the ensembles, one by one, each to the strains of their own melodies, both the regional and national ones. And briskly, for several dozen seconds at a time, without a break, as all the musical bands are already there, on stage. They pass the musical notes from one side of the stage to the other, as they did yesterday in the SOKÓŁ courtyard. And what about them? What about the children from all the mountains in the world? It looks as if they were saying goodbye to us, bidding us farewell through dancing and singing...

And in the end, they all really do roll dancing onto the stage. The entire FESTIVAL seems to be spinning right before our eyes for the last time this year. They sit down. All of them except for the Hungarians. They, in their little area of the stage floor, dance, sing, ever so quietly, finally freezing in each other's arms.

And once the Hungarians are seated too, a girl enters, singing a lullaby. And she is holding a baby in her arms. It is loved and safe.

They have sown smiles, joy, love, goodness... may they reap PEACE.

Andrzej Zarych: “Let us thank all the young people, those who taught them to dance, their parents... Let us wish them a good journey home. Let us give thanks with wholehearted applause.”

Rev. Dr Stanisław Kowalik: “Dear God, do not forsake us, do not forsake us, for otherwise we will be lost beyond redemption.” And then a blessing for the journey home.

And finally: “Siskin, siskin...”


Time to go home!