After taking part in the Ton Koopman Academy, Krystyna Kulisiewicz discovered that the early music world might be the right fit for her.
Eventually, this resulted in her being back in Den Haag for her master in Violone.
'I participated in the Ton Koopman academy during my gap year, after graduating from my classical music bachelor's and before deciding to go further with my musical education. My teacher, Maggie Urquhart, whom I had the pleasure to meet already before, shared the information about the Academy with me and I decided to participate, just because I had a strong affinity for early music, and I had no other plans for these days. I didn’t know that it would turn out to be so important to me afterwards.
During the Academy, I got the chance to meet many wonderful people from the early music world and I immediately got the impression that I would fit in this world as well.
I appreciated the instrumental lessons and various workshops, but what I most enjoyed was the chance to play during the final concert. Considering my limited experience in performing early music, it was a privilege to play in an ensemble with more experienced musicians. We performed a fragment of Bach’s Mass in b-minor – one of my favourite pieces of all time. After the concert, I received positive feedback which reassured me that playing early music might be something to consider as a future carrier choice.
Even though after participating in the Academy I already felt connected to the early music world, I didn’t plan to study further immediately. It was a long process of considering what is good for me for this moment of my life. It was again my amazing teacher, Maggie Urquhart, who was open to talk to me about studying at KonCon, convinced me that I could benefit from this decision and helped me to prepare for my entrance exams. Without her, I probably wouldn’t have done it.
Thanks to the Academy, I already had an idea of how much KonCon can offer in terms of the research trajectory and otherwise. Now, being a full-time master's student, I can benefit from all that. I hope that by the end of this programme I will not only be a better musician, feeling at home in the early music area, but also a more experienced artistic researcher, maybe even considering taking the research further, and a confident, organised entrepreneur who can make a living out of music.'