BUDKI NIEZNANOWSKIE/KAMIONKA STRUMILOWA

Budki Nieznanowskie – not-existing village (destroyed in 1944) in the former Ternopil province, today Kamionka Buzkaya area in the Lviv region (since 1945 Ukraine). It laid between Nieznanow and Tartak. Place of family origin from the side of my Mother…

Website about BUDKI NIEZNANOWSKIE

Kamionka Strumilowa – Kamionka Buzanska, Kamionka Strumilowa until 1945 – a city in Ukraine, Lviv region, the seat of the Kamionka region, until 1945 in Poland, in the Ternopil region. Beloved town of Grandpa Jan (and the city it was of course, Lviv)…

Website about KAMIONKA STRUMILOWA

GOLUB-DOBRZYN / TORUN

Golub-Dobrzyn – formally it was established May 15, 1951 by the linking of two cities Golub and Dobrzyn which are situated on the opposite banks of the Drweca river. City of my school years, hometown, just my Heimat …

GOLUB-DOBRZYN ON THE OLD PHOTO

Website of UMiG in Golub-Dobrzyn

Torun – everyone knows Torun, Old Town, Copernicus, Teutonic Knights, Vistula, the rock band: Republika … and privately: the place of my birth.

JUST TORUN

POZNAN

Poznan – the city of my studies and current work. City of students, sometimes callad the economic capital of Poland. City of a good history: the first Piast dynasty, king Przemysl, the Uprisings in 1918 and in June 1956 … My city.

WE CAN WIN– CD, of which I am the initiator / founder and patron.

EXHIBITION IN PRESIDENTIAL PALACE 2013 – from 1’01 to 1’21 can even listen to Paderewski with my performance

GRUSZCZYN / SWARZEDZ

Gruszczyn – village located in the north-east of Poznan, belonging to the Swarzędz municipality. Population is estimated at approx. 1200 people, but steadily increasing due to the fast-growing single-family housing. For fifteen years it has been the residence of our family of five …

MAP of Gruszczyn

Swarzedz – city in the Greater Poland in Poznań County, the seat of the Swarzedz municipality. Located on  Swarzedz Lake, approx. 15 km from the center of Poznan, it is a part of the Poznań agglomeration.

On  December,31th 2014 Swarzędz had 31 035 inhabitants. It is the eighth largest in the Greater Poland province and has one of the largest population density among Polish cities (3 779 people / km² – 4. rate in the country).

City of schools of my children and the work of my wife. Good city…

SWARZEDZ – the right place

VIOLIN CONCERT D MAJOR OF PETER TCHAIKOVSKY

Vinyl with Tchaikovsky’s violin concert performed by Oleg Kagan “stabbed me in the ground”. As a teenager, thanks to this album I liked classical music. My favorite concert. The performance of Kagan was a kind of the “benchmark”, but Anne-Sophie Mutter with her  record dated 2004 added something new to this concert…

VIOLIN CONCERT E MINOR OF FELIX MENDELSSOHN-BARTHOLDY

“Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin…” – it’s from Leonard Cohen, but in the hands of Anne-Sophie Mutter the violin sound particularly wonderful. Violin offers great technical capabilities, and a variety of extracted sound is huge. I’ve got Mendelssohn or Tchaikovsky Concert maybe in 10 performances …

V (E MINOR) and VI (H MINOR) Symphony of Tchaikovsky

The music is full of emotion… Fate knocking to our door. Classical symphonies with the Slavic soul. The amount of people (over 80 thousand people) at his funeral proves its greatness (as a musician). Tragic figure standing against insoluble conflict…

BEETHOVEN, BACH, CHOPIN, PROKOFIEW, HAENDEL, HAYDN, MOZART, RACHMANINOW …

Rachmaninow “All-night stands” (Все́нощное бде́ние) … Rachmaninov Vespers All-Night Vigil. Рахманинов Всенощное бдение

All-night stands(Wsienoszcznoje Bdienije) mixed choir

WLODZIMIERZ WYSOCKI

Высоцкого причисляют к бардовской музыке, однако здесь нужно сделать оговорку. Тематика песен и манера исполнения Высоцкого заметно отличалась от большинства других, «интеллигентных» бардов …

“Что-то воздуху мне мало, ветер пью, туман глотаю,
Чую с гибельным восторгом – пропадаю, пропадаю! …”

Wysocki …

Breath of Freedom…

BULAT SHALVOVICH OKUDZHAVA

Б.Ш. Окуджава родился 9 мая 1924 года в Москве в семье партийных работников (отец-грузин, мать-армянка). Жил на Арбате. В 1937 году ро-дители арестованы. Отец расстрелян, мать сослана в караган-динский лагерь…

“Пока земля еще вертится,
Пока еще ярок свет…”

Poet of reverie and reflections…

JACEK KACZMARSKI

Ripped on the tape recorder in very early mornings in the 80s. “Fifteen minutes from Jacek Kaczmarski” broadcasted on Radio Free Europe … The first song played on the guitar … Today, with some of his beliefs I do not identify, but for me he is still a big figure.

“My Lord, You gave me an armour
An old armourer made it
Creased in many battles
Baptised in blood
As it was made for a giant
I trip all the time
Because as a blackmail of my conciousness
It crashes my left side … ”

Song, which fights…

LEONARD COHEN

I tortured my guitar and … my family with his music. Cohen gained extraordinary popularity in Poland (thanks to Maciej Zembaty) where in the 80s he was better known than in his native country – Canada. Hallelujah went even to churches…

“Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic till I’m gathered safely in
Lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove
Dance me to the end of love … ”

Poet of song, Poet of love…

KATE BUSH

Kate Bush charms with her fairy-tale atmosphere, but also sometimes shows her demonic mood. Beautiful, but difficult texts. Music works its fascinating magic with world of sounds. In the early discs girly spontaneity, later, more mature, but still, as once Thomas Beksinski wrote –  eternally young girl, sometimes even a little girl.

“And if I only could,
I’d make a deal with God,
And I’d get him to swap our places …”

KING CRIMSON/FOCUS/CAMEL/MOODY BLUES/THE NICE/GENTLE GIANT/JETHRO TULL/ELECTRIC LIGHT ORCHESTRA

JETHRO TULL and KING CRIMSON albums dated 1969 (my birthyear) “Stand Up” and “In the Court Of The King Krimson”  – true masterpieces.

MOODY BLUES (like ELO from Birmingham) – album from 1967  “Days of Future Passed”, symphonic sound, a fusion of rock and classical music (some kind of rock art – in Poland: RSC)

FOCUS and CAMEL, THE NICE AND GENTLE GIANT ... some music is revelation … who doesn’t know it, should listen (as I am writing these words I am listening to Supertwister from Mirage albumu by Camel Group in the background).

ELO (in the song of Chuck Berry) “Roll Over Beethoven”: … The line “roll over Beethoven and tell Tchaikovsky the news” refers to how both classical composers would “roll over in their graves” upon hearing how their classical music had given way to rock and roll…. in the song “Rock ‚n’ roll is king”:  “She rolled over Beethoven and she gave Tchaikovsky back. She loves that drivin’ beat, she goes dancin’ on down the street. She said rock ‚n’ roll is king“.

JOHNY CASH

Man in Black. A cult character. Great Musican.
The cult film “Walk the Line” and the Broadway musical “Ring of Fire” (I had the opportunity to see it in New York in 2003).
Sometimes I like to play his songs on the guitar… “Hurt” is very moving…

“I hurt myself today,
To see if I still feel.
I focus on the pain,
The only thing that’s real…”

PUHDYS i KARUSELL

Rock from … GDR. Nostalgia … and two great albums:

And besides, our Polish music, inter alia: CZERWONO CZARNI, CZERWONE GITARY, CZESŁAW NIEMEN, MAREK GRECHUTA I ANAWA, IZA TROJANOWSKA from 1980 -1981, first albums of PERFECT and MAANAM, TSA, BRYGADA KRYZYS, RSC, DŻEM, MARTYNA JAKUBOWICZ, MAREK JACKOWSKI, GRZEGORZ CIECHOWSKI, MYSLOVITZ …

and THE CLASH, THE STRANGLERS, THE POLICE, DIRE STRAITS, PINK FLOYD, EMERSON LAKE AND PALMER, QUEEN, BOB DYLAN, SIMON AND GARFUNKEL, THE DOORS, THE BEATLES, ULTRAVOX, KATIE MELUA, DIANA KRALL, SADE …

ALPINE SKIING

Winter sport for whole family. All five (one traitor who selects more often snowboard) ski every year in winter: Alpe Cermis, Paganella – Andalo, Livigno, Alpe Lusia, Latemar, Schladming, Pec, Spindleruv Mlyn, Zieleniec, Szklarska Poreba …

CROSS COUNTRY SKIING

A kind of winter inline skating. Unfortunately there is almost no snow in Poznan in last years. But each time we are in the mountains we do cross country skiing.

ICE HOCKEY

Sport of my youth. Evenings spent on the ice and backwaters of Drwęca river. It turned out that hockey is not just a team game, but you can also play one on one :-)

INLINE SKATING

If some activity i can be called “high-performance :-)”, it is “inline skating” for sure. My personal record in the marathon (42.2 km) in Berlin in 2014 was 1:48:20,  regular I do 10 or 20 kilometers around Malta Lake and around our Swarzędz Lake.

BIKE

Gruszczyn abounds in bicycle paths. But it isn’t a problem to ride to work (13,5 km)…

TABLE TENNIS

Welcome to the “challenge” in Gruszczyn. For now, the only tournament “INC Cup” which we organized in our company won Piotr Oleksy, but he previously trained in the table tennis club. Second place was satisfying.

BADMINTON

Very dynamic game, if you play for real. Next year (2017) I promise to myself to join any of Poznan amateur league… and at last in January 2017: I started regular badminton training (once a week 2h).

TENNIS

In Golub-Dobrzyn it was some concrete and asphalt tennis with my college Janusz. For several years I played in different amateur leagues in Poznan and Swarzedz. I will never forget comments about my game in Swarzedz: “Hey look. He cannot play, but he wins with Stach…”. As you can see, “random walk” can be an ally (or an enemy), not only on the stock market, but also on the tennis court…

KAYAK

Drweca, Drava, Black Hancza, Warta … rafting rivers to relax in a clean environment. Nature, effort, good company … but what about the canoe which sunk in Drweca river at 1st May of (… ??) year. Proof that I’m getting old. I do not remember the year… but it was probably about 20/25 years ago.

WINDSURFING

From the time when I first went windsurfing, I liked it. Now come these days that I can ask my son – Janek to teach me how to improve  my technique …

SAIL BOAT

I would like to sail again, but where to find my lost sailing license…

And besides – team sports: football, basketball, handball, volleyball, field hockey. There is only one problem – you need at least 10 people… Going further – chess, billiard, table hockey Oh, and I almost forgot – Arc sports … There might be a reason that the people building the neighbor’s house called me once “Robin Hood”; not to mention my son Jan, who broke our neighbors window twice. An arrow stuck in the kitchen furniture gave our neighbor almost hearth attack (he did not live in this house, which was just a kind of holiday house)…

First of all, the classic cinema. Black-and-white productions and those already colored from 50s and 60s are able to provide me with experience that rarely can be find in current productions “without a soul” but often vulgar and flashy. It may be due to the fact that the “old” films that I watch,  are already verified movies by several generations of viewers, so the chaff has been separated from the grain in a natural way with the help of the passage of time. My 10 favorite films in each decade (except for 50s):

The ’20s and the ’30s

1926: Metropolis, director: Fritz Lang

1930: Der Blaue Engel, director: Josef von Stenberg, starring: Marlene Dietrich, Emil Jannings

1930: Little Ceasar, director: Mervyna LeRoya, starring: Edward G. Robinson

1931:  M-Eine Stadt sucht einen Moerder, director: Fritz Lang, starring: Peter Lorre, Otto Wernicke

1935: Mutiny on the Bounty, director: Frank Lloyd, starring: Clark Gable, Charles Laughton

1936: Modern Times, director: Charles Chaplin, starring: Charles Chaplin

1938: Angels with Dirty Faces, director: Michael Curtiz, starring: James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart

1938: Aleksandr Niewskij, director: Siergiej Eisenstein, starring: Nikołaj Czerkasow, music: Siergiej Prokofiew

1939: Gone with the Wind, director: Victor Fleming, starring: Vivien Leigh, Clark Gable

1939: Stagecoach, director: John Ford, starring: John Wayne, Claire Trevor

The ’40s

1940: The Great Dictator, director: Charles Chaplin, starring: Charles Chaplin

1941: Citizen Kane, director: Orson Welles, starring: Orson Welles

1942: Casablanca, director: Michael Curtiz, starring: Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Peter Lorre

1942: The Womean of the Year, director: George Stevens, starring: Katharine Hupbern, Spencer Tracy

1944: Going My Way, director: Leo McCarey, starring: Bing Crosby

1947: Dark Passage, director: Delmer Davis, starring: Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall

1948: The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, director: John Huston, starring: Humphrey Bogart, Waler Huston

1948: Lardi di Biciclette, director: Vittorio De Sica, starring: Lamberto Maggiorani

1948: Gone with the Wind, director: John Huston, starring: Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Edward G. Robinson

1948: Ostatni etap, director: Wanda Jakubowska, starring: Wanda Bartówna

The ’50s (part 1)

1950: Sunset Boulvard, director: Billy Wilder, starring: Gloria Swanson, William Holden

1952: High Noon, diretor: Fred Zinnemann, starring: Gary Cooper, Grace Kelly, Thomas Mitchell

1952: Singin’ in the Rain), directors: Gene Kelly, Stanley Donen, starring: Gene Kelly

1953: Seven Samurai, director: Akira Kurosawa, starring: Toshiro Mifune

1954: The Caine Mutiny, director: Edward Dmytryk, starring: Humphrey Bogard

1956: Rear Window, director: Alfred Hitchcock, starring: James Stewart, Grace Kelly

1955: Rebel without a Cause, director: Nicholas Ray, starring: James Dean, Natalie Wood

1955: River of no Return, director: Otto Preminger, starring: Merylin Monroe, Robert Mitchum

1956: Kanal, director: Andrzej Wajda, starring: Wieńczysław Gliński, Tadeusz Janczar

1957: The Bridge on the River Kwai, director: David Lean, starring: Alec Guiness, William Holden, Jack Hawkins

The ’50s (part 2)

1957: Letiat żurawli, director: Michaił Kałatozow, starring: Tatiana Samojłowa, Aleksiej Batałow

1958: Vertigo, director: Alfred Hitchcock, starring: James Stewart, Kim Novak

1958: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, director: Richard Brooks, starring: Elizabeth Taylor, Paul Newman

1958: The Old Man and the Sea, director: John Sturges, starring: Spencer Tracy

1958: Rebel without a Cause, director: Nicholas Ray, starring: James Dean, Natalie Wood

1958: Ashes And Diamonds, director: Andrzej Wajda, starring: Zbigniew Cybulski

1959: Some Like it Hot, director: Billy Wilder, starring: Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon

1959: North by Northwest, director: Alfred Hitchcock, starring: Cary Grant

1959: Rio Bravo, director: Howard Hawks, starring: John Wayne, Dean Martin, Walter Brennan, Ricky Nelson

1960: Psycho, director: Alfred Hitchcock, starring: Anthony Perkins

The ’60s

1960: Bad Luck, director: Andrzej Munk, starring: Bogumił Kobiela

1960: Breakfast at Tiffany’s, director: Blake Edwards, starring: Audrey Hepburn

1961: Knife in the water, director: Roman Polański, starring: Leon Niemczyk, Jolanta Umecka, Zygmunt Malanowicz

1962: Birdman of Alcatraz, director: john Frankenheimer, starring: Burt Lancaster

1962: Lawrence of Arabia, director: David Lean, starring: Peter O’Tool, Omar Sharif, Anthony Quinn, Alec Guiness

1962:  The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, director: John Ford, starring: James Stewart, John Wayne, Lee Marvin

1963: Birds, director: Alfred Hitchcok, starring: Rod Taylor, Tippi Hedren

1964: Zorba the Greek, director: Michael Cacoyannis, starring: Anthony Quinn

1965: Doktor Zhivago, director: David Lean, starring: Omar Sharif

1967: Rosemary’s Baby, director: Roman Polański, starring: Mia Farrow

The ’70s

1971: The Godfather, director: Francis Ford Coppola, starring: Marlon Brando, Al Pacino

1972: Jesus Christ Superstar, director: Norman Jewison

1974: Chinatown, director: Robert Polański, starring: Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Huston

1974: Ziemia obiecana, director: Andrzej Wajda, starring: Danierl Olbrychski, Wojciech Pszoniak, Andrzej Seweryn

1975: One Flew over the Cockoo’s Nest, director: Milos Forman, starring: Jack Nicholson

1976: A Bridge Too Far, director: Richard Attenborough

1978: Grease, director: Randal Kleiser, starring: John Travolta, Olivia Newton-John

1978: The Deer Hunter, director: Michael Cimino, starring: Robert de Niro

1979: Kramer vs. Kramer, director: Robert Benton, starring: Dustin Hoffman, Meryl Streep

1979: Blues Brothers, director: John Landis, starring: John Belushi, Dan Aykroyd

The ’80s

1981: Das Boot, director: Wolfgang Petersen, starring: Juergen Prochnow

1982: Trading Places, director: John Landis, starring: Dan Aykroyd, Eddie Murphy

1982: The Wall, director: Allan Parker, starring: Bob Geldof, muz. Pink Floyd

1984: Amadeus, director: Milos Forman, starring: Tom Hulce, F. Murray Abraham

1985: Out of Africa, director: Sydney Pollack, starring: Meryl Streep, Robert Redford, Klaus Maria Brandauer

1986: The Mission, director: Roland Joffe, starring: Robert de Niro

1987: Wall Street, director: Oliver Stone, starring: Michael Douglas, Sean Young, Charlie Sheen, Darryl Hannah

1988: Trylogia Qatsi (Pawaqqatsi, Koyaanisqatsi, Naqoyqatsi), director: Godfrey Reggio, muz. Philip Glass

1988: Rain Man, director: Barry Levinson, starring: Dustin Hoffman, Tom Cruise

1989: Kino Paradiso, director: Giuseppe Tornatore, starring: Phillipe Noiret, Salvatore Cascio

1990: Sny, director: Akiro Kurosawa, starring: Martin Scorsese

The ’90s

1990: Dances with Wolves, director: Kevin Costner, starring: Kevin Costner

1991: The double life of Veronique, director: Krzysztof Kieślowski, starring: Irene Jacob

1993-1994: Three colors: blue, white, red, director: Krzysztof Kieślowski, starring: Irene Jacob, Zbigniew Zamachowski, Juliette Binoche

1993: Como aqua para chocolade, director: Alfonso Arau, starring: Lumi Cavazos

1993: The Fugitive, director: Andrew Davis, starring: Harrison Ford

1996: Microcosmos: Le peuple de l’herbe, director: Claude Nuridsany, Marie Perrenou

1997: The Devil’s Advocate, director: Taylor Hackford, starring: Keanu Reeves, Al Pacino, Charlize Theron

1998: The Truman Show, director: Peter Weir, starring: Jim Carrey, music: Philip Glass, Burkhard von Dallwitz

1998: Saving Private Ryan, director: Steven Spielberg, starring: Tom Hanks

1998: U Pana Boga za piecem, director: Jacek Bromski, starring:Krzysztof Dzierma

Between the years 2000 and 2016

2000: Chocolat, director: Lasse Hallstrom, starring: Juliette Binoche, Johny Depp, music: Rachel Portman

2001: Enemy at the Gates, director: Jean-Jacques Annaud, starring: Jude Law, Ed Harris, Rachel Weisz

2001: Le fabuleux destin d’Amelie Poulain, director: Jean-Pierre Jeunet, starring: Audrey Tautou

2001-2003: Trilogy The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Wowers, The Return of the King, director: Peter Jackson, starring: Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen

2001-2003: Trilogy Matrix, Matrix: Reactivation, Matrix: Revolutions, directors: Larry i Andy Wachowski, starring: Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne

2002: The Pianist, director: Roman Polański, starring: Adrien Brody

2002: Chicago, director: Rob Marshall, starring: Catherine Zeta-Jones, Renee Zellweger, Richard Gere

2006: Apocalypto, director: Mel Gibson. starts: Rudy Younglood, Raoul Trujillo

2012-2014: Trilogy The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies, director: Peter Jackson, starring: Martin Freeman, Ian McKellen

2014: Relatos salvajes, director: Damian Szifron

Read in 2016 (year leasts: 3 most interesting in 5 categories)

ECONOMY

1. Norman C. Miller – Exchange Rate Economics: The Uncovered Interest Parity Puzzle and Other Anomalies
2. Ethan S. Harris – Ben Bernanke’s Fed: The Federal Reserve After Greenspan
3. John Rothchild – The Bear Book. Surfive and Profit in Ferocious Markets

HISTORY

1.  Snyder Timothy – Bloodlands. Europe Between Hitler and Stalin
2. Morys-Twarowski Michel – Polish Empire
3. Wojtczak Jarosław – Philippines 1898-1902

IDEAS

1. Roger Scruton – How to be a Conservative
2. Donald Trump – Great Again. How to Fix Our Crippled America
3. Piotr Zychowicz – Żydzi. Opowieści niepoprawne politycznie

FICTION

1. Walter Wangerin – The Book of God. The Bible as the Novel
2. Elżbieta Cherezińska – Harda
3. Libera Antoni – Niech się panu darzy

REPORTAGES/MEMORIES AND OTHER

1. Eltchaninoff Michel – What Putin has in mind?
2. Ashlee Vance – Elon Musk
3. Winiarczyk Mirosław – 100 conservative films

Read in 2015 (3 most interesting in 5 categories)

ECONOMY

1. Woś Rafał – An Infantile disorder of liberalism
2. Rajan Rashuram G. – Fault Lines
3. Wapshott Nicholas – Keynes versus Hayek

HISTORY

1. Snyder Timothy – Black earth. The Holocaust as history and warning
2. Demel Juliues – History of Romania
3. Suworow Wiktor – Survov’s Alphabet

IDEAS

1. Taleb Nassim Nicholas – Black Swan
2. Haigt Jonathan – The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are divided by politics and religion
3. Collins Jim – How the Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In

FICTION

1. Cherezińska Elżbieta – Legion
2. Houellebecq Michel – Submission
3. Grisham John – Theodore Boone. Kid Lawyer

FEATURE/MEMORIES

1. Surmiak-Domańska Katarzyna – The Ku Klux Klan. Here lives the love
2. Kłopotowski Krzysztof – The genius of the Jews in the Polish mind
3. Kienzler Iwona – Life in PRL. And scary, and funny

Read in 2014 (3 most interesting in 5 categories)

ECONOMY

1. Skousen Mark – The Making of Modern Economics: the Lives and Ideas of the Great Thinkers
2. Greenspan Allan – The Map and the Territory
3. Bookstaber M. Ricard – A Demon of Our Own Design: Markets, Hedge Funds, and the Perils of Financial Innovation

HISTORY

1. Richie Alexandra – Warsaw 1944 and Zychowicz Piotr – Madness 1944
2. Zychowicz Piotr – Ribbentrop-Beck Pact
3. Clarke Stephen – Years of Annoying the French

IDEAS

1. Scruton Roger – The Uses of Pessimism: And the Danger of False Hope
2. Balcerowicz Leszek – You have to fight
3. Wildstein Bronisław – Limited democracy and why I do not like the Third Republic

FICTION

1. Tolkien J.R.R. – Hobbit
2. Piasecki Sergiusz – Lover of the Great Bear
3. Glukhovsky Dmitry – Metro 2033

FEATURE/MEMORIES

1. Poczobut Andrzej – System Belarus
2. Buczkowski Zbyszek – Mr.! Just write a book!
3. Ceraficki Joachim – Wasserpolacken