Zubel Agata
Born in Wrocław, she graduated with honours from the composition class of Jan Wichrowski at the Music Academy in Wrocław. She also studied singing with Danuta Paziuk-Zipser, and continued her studies at the Conservatorium Hogeschool in Enschede,Netherlands and at numerous masterclasses. In 2004, she obtained a PhD in music. She currently lectures at the Music Academy in Wrocław.
She has been awarded scholarships from the Ernst von Siemens Foundation, Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage, Wrocław City Council and the International Foundation for Education. She is an Ordinary Member of the Polish Composers’ Union.
She has performed on many concert stages and at prestigious festivals of contemporary music both in Poland and abroad, interpreting works by Karol Szymanowski, Paweł Szymański, Witold Lutosławski (including Chantefleurs et chantefables) and her own compositions. She has premiered and recorded numerous works by contemporary composers.
She also appears on the opera stage, including the title roles in Zygmunt Krauze’s The Star (electroacoustic adaptation by Cezary Duchnowski at the Polski Theatre in Wrocław, 2005) and Dobromiła Jaskot’s Phèdre at the National Opera in Warsaw. In 2010 she sang the only vocal part in her opera/balletBetween, also staged at the National Opera.
She has received the following awards and prizes: 1st Prize at the Andrzej Panufnik Composition Competition (1999), 1st Prize and Polish Radio Special Prize at the Adam Didur National Composition Competition (2000), 1st Prize at the Krzysztof Penderecki International Contemporary Music Competition (2002), Main Prize of the L. Kronenberg Foundation (2003), 3rd Prize at the Concours Nicati, Switzerland (2003), 2nd Prize at the Jurgenson International Young Composers Competition in Moscow (2003), Special Prize for the Elettrovoce duo (of which she is a member) at the International Gaudeamus Competition in Amsterdam (2005). In 2005, she has received the Passport Award from Polish weekly “Polityka” for her “outstanding vocal creations,“ as well as for her work as a composer.
In 2009 she won the Orpheus Prize of the Polish Musicians’ Association for her creative interpretation of the vocal part in Cezary Duchnowski’s Martha’s Garden at the 52nd Warsaw Autumn Festival and for her interpretation of works by Polish composers at a number of preceding Warsaw Autumn festivals.
In 2009 two new CDs were published by CD Accord: Cascando with her own chamber music and Poemswith the songs of Copland, Berg and Szymański.
Her Symphony No. 2, commissioned by Deutsche Welle, was premiered during the Beethoven Festival in Bonn (2005). Her other commissions include String Quartet No. 1 for the Ultraschall Festival in Berlin (2007), of Songs for the Wratislavia Cantans Festival (2007), Cascando for the Festival of Central European Music in Seattle (2007), and Symphony No. 3 as part of a scholarship from the Rockefeller Foundation (2008), Aphorisms on Miłosz for Sacrum Profanum Festival in Krakow (2011), Shades of Ice for London Sinfonietta (2011), What is the word for Klangforum Wien (2012). In 2010 her opera/ballet was premiered in Grand Theatre–National Opera in Warsaw and in 2011 she received a new opera commission for this theatre, Oresteia. In 2011 she was invited as composer-in-residence to the Other Minds Festival in San Francisco. During last two seasons (2010–2012) she was also composer-in-residence at the Cracow Philharmonic.
