Described as a “visionary and poet of the cello”, Bartosz Koziak has gained the acclaim of music lovers and critics not only for his extraordinary interpretation of works by both classical and contemporary composers but also for his thoughtful and often daring program choices.
He has performed at the Konzerthaus in Berlin, the Berliner Philharmonie, Rudolfinum in Prague, Cité de la Musique in Paris, Teatro Politeama in Palermo, the Khachaturian Concert Hall in Yerevan and the National Philharmonic in Warsaw.
The orchestras he has played with as a soloist include the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, Warsaw Philharmonic, Sinfonia Varsovia, Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte Carlo, Concerto Budapest, the Armenian State Orchestra, the Prague Philharmonic, the Radio Orchestras in Warsaw and Budapest, the National Orchestra of Ukraine, and has been conducted by Krzysztof Penderecki, Jan Krenz , Antoni Wit, Gabriel Chmura, Jacek Kaspszyk, András Keller, Volodymyr Sirenko and Sergey Smbatayan.
He has been invited to leading festivals including Warsaw Autumn, Festspiele Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Ludwig van Beethoven Easter Festival, Yerevan Music Perspectives, Young Euro Classic in Berlin, Musica Polonica Nova, Chopin i Jego Europa, Warsaw and East Meets West, Korea.
As an established performer of contemporary music, Bartosz Koziak was a long time and regular guest participant in Krzysztof Penderecki’s concert projects. He participated in the first CD recording of the Concerto grosso conducted by the composer and has performed most of his cello works.
Bartosz Koziak has given first performances of a number of works including the “DoubleCello Concerto” by Hanna Kulenty, the Cello Concerto by Anna Zawadzka-Gołosz, “Sixth commandment” by Elżbieta Sikora, performed together with “Quando stanno morendo. Diario polacco no.2” by Luigi Nono as part of the Sikora/Nono project with Les Métaboles ensemble and SWR Experimentalstudio
His discography includes recordings of Grażyna Bacewicz’s Second Cello Concerto, Krzysztof Meyer’s Cello Concerto “Canti Amadei”, Bohuslav Martinů’s Cello Concerto No.2 and the premiere recording of Feliks Nowowiejski’s Cello Concerto (DUX), two CDs with Justyna Danczowska of cello and piano works by Schubert, Schumann, Franck and Shostakovich, and an album of Martinů, Kodály and Ravel, recorded with Anna Maria Staśkiewicz (Sarton).
Bartosz Koziak won the 3rd Witold Lutosławski International Cello Competition in 2001 in Warsaw, the 2nd prize at the Isang Yun Competition in Tongyeong (Korea) and is a laureate of the Mikola Lysenko International Competition in Kiev. He was awarded a Special Prize at the Prague Spring Competition and was winner of the 1st prize at the 11th International Competition of Contemporary Chamber Music in Kraków. He has also received prizes at the Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow and ARD in Munich. In 2003, he received a special award from the Polish Culture Foundation presented by Ewa Podleś.
In the 2024/25 season, Bartosz Koziak will perform as a soloist in Görlitz with Martinů’s Cello Concerto No. 2 and in Bydgoszcz with Nowowiejski’s Cello Concerto, as well as in recitals promoting the album Laks – Weinberg – Rathaus in Estonia and the USA. He is also planning a new project featuring the music of Chopin in collaboration with Krzysztof Książek. In his chamber music activities, Koziak plans to record Laks’ Piano Quintet and Dialogues for Two Cellos, and will perform with the V4 String Quartet in Prague and Budapest.
He graduated with distinction “Magna cum Laude” from the classes of Professor Kazimierz Michalik and Andrzej Bauer at the Fryderyk Chopin University of Music, Warsaw, and from Philippe Muller’s class at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris .
Thanks to Kaja Danczowska, he plays a 19th-century copy of a J. Guadagnini instrument which the eminent Polish cellist Dezyderiusz Danczowski used for concerts.
