Michał Pepol

Cellist, composer and arranger Michał Pepol is a classically trained musician who does not fit into genres, an artist always hungry for new experiences, transgressions and non-obvious contexts. He is the co-founder of the Royal String Quartet, the originator and co-organizer of Kwartesencja festival in Warsaw, the curator of Klangor festival in Warmia and the author of the Dotykafonie concert series at the Nowy Teatr in Warsaw. In October 2024 Polskie Radio released his second solo album „Cellotapes”.

In 2022, he debuted with the project “Kora infinity” (Agora Muzyka), which contains unknown and unreleased recordings of the legendary Polish rock star Kora Jackowska and received enthusiastic reviews. The album was recognized as one of the ten best Polish albums of 2022 by Polityka weekly, TVN 24 and Onet. For the album, Pepol was nominated for the Koryfeusz Polish Music Award in the Personality of the Year 2022 category. In 2023, the album was released in a vinyl version with four premiere songs recorded with invited guests: Magdalena Cielecka, Ralph Kaminski and Baasch.

Pepol is the creator of projects such as “The Sound Regained” in cooperation with Paweł Bownik (Nowy Teatr, 2016), “The Silence of the Sirens” in a duet with Magdalena Cielecka (commissioned by the Museum of Modern Art, 2017) and “Among Angels” (2017) realized in the Biała forest. He is the author of music for Markus Öhrn’s plays “Three Episodes from the Life of a Family” (2021) and “Fobia” (2023), and since 2015 he has been performing in Krzysztof Warlikowski’s play “The French”. He invited the great lady of Polish song, Sława Przybylska, to create the sound installation “We are standing by the walls of the ghetto” (ŻiH, 2022).

Pepol collaborates with many artists: with Bartek Wąsik, he co-creates the duo Dwóchgłos (Duovoice), and also performs, among others, with Natalia Przybysz, Mela Koteluk, Kuba Krzewiński, Olga Mysłowska and Patryk Zakrocki. He performed at many festivals, such as Warsaw Autumn, OFF, Męskie Granie, Nostalgia, Ephemera, POMADA, Enter Enea Festival, Słuchy, EtnoKraków/Crossroads, Tranströmer Days, Szalone Dni Muzyki and the Festival of Premieres.

He is a frequent guest on Polskie Radio 2, and he also recorded his recitals for TVP Kultura, where he was the curator of the Kultura Live concert series. Since 2003, he has been teaching chamber music classes at the Karol Szymanowski Music College in Warsaw. In 2022, he received an Artistic Scholarship of the Capital City of Warsaw.