Czeslaw Niemen

Czeslaw Niemen (real name Czeslaw Juliusz Wydrzycki) (February 16, 1939 - January 17, 2004) was one of the most important and original Polish singer-songwriters and rock balladeers of the last quarter-century, singing mainly in the Polish language.

Niemen was born in Stare Wasiliszki in Grodno Province. After the World War II it became a part of Byelorussian SSR and in the 1950s he was allowed to move to Poland. He made his debut in the early 1960s, singing Polish rock and soul music. He possessed an unusually wide voice range and equally rich intonation. He was also an ardent composer and a keyboard player.

Soon after his first successful concerts in France, he started to use the pseudonym Niemen instead of his real name, gaining wider notoriety in Poland and making it easier to pronounce by foreigners (Niemen is a Polish pronunciation of the Neman River and this way he wanted to mark his birth country).

His song of 1967, "Dziwny jest ten swiat" (Strange Is This World) became the most important Polish protest song of that era. He was one of the first Polish performers to wear long hair and colourful clothes and introducing psychedelia style to communist Poland, what annoyed the officials. The first three LP album's Niemen recorded with his band "Akwarele" (Watercolours). Subsequently, he recorded with his other new bands: "Enigmatic", "Grupa Niemen" and "Aerolit".

In 1969 he changed musical style to progressive rock while recording the monumental album Enigmatic. The most notable song from it was "Bema pamieci zalobny rapsod" (A Mournful Rhapsody in Memory of Jozef Bem), based on the 19th century poem by Cyprian Kamil Norwid. The rest of Enigmatic songs were a sung poetry as well. Niemen played Hammond organ, later mellotron and Moog synthesizer on his records.

In the early 1970s, Niemen recorded three English language albums under the CBS label. In 1974 he recorded Mourner's Rhapsody with Jan Hammer and Rick Laird from Mahavishnu Orchestra. In the seventies, Niemen turned to jazz-rock fusion and electronic music (Katharsis album). In 1972 he also contributed with a song performed by him in "Wesele" (The Wedding (1972 film) by director Andrzej Wajda, laureate of an honorary Oscar.

Later, Niemen also composed film soundtracks and theater music. In the 1990s he showed interest in art painting and computer graphics. He died of cancer in Warsaw.

Photo author: kadenza_flickr from flickr.com