If you are a music fanatic and looking out for the best music festival in town, Pol’and’Rock Festival is the place for you to experience the best of its kind.
The Pol’and’Rock Festival was known as the Woodstock Festival Poland formerly. It is a music festival that takes place annually highlighting rock as its central genre. The concept was influenced by the 1969 Woodstock that still reminds the whole music fraternity of its foundation. This festival first opened its doors in 1995 gathering thousands of music fanatics every year. The number of people visiting the festival also grew exponentially over the years. In 2019, they aggregated the total number of visitors so far which was a whopping 750,000. The extensive footfall and popularity make it one of the biggest of its kind globally.
Background
The festival came into existence in the year of 1994 by a man called Jerzy Owsiak who was inspired by his visit to the original Woodstock Music Festival in the US. He started his own Woodstock after 25 years. Their motto is Love, Music, Friendship that forms the value and morale of the whole festival. The festival is organized by the Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity.
The weekend-long event houses two stages where artists perform from afternoon to the wee hours of the dawn. Some of the best bands to have performed on their stage include Judas Priest, Papa Roach, Shaggy, The Prodigy, Kontrust, and many others. They have always promoted new artists and underground musicians. Each year, they hold a competition before the start date of the festival and all the winners get an opportunity to perform on the actual stage. Rock is the central music theme but audiences also experience an amalgamation of music and flavors with other genres such as folk, experimental, and metal. In recent years, owing to the increasing popularity, the festival also hots music across the genres of reggae, classical, and electronic.
In Pop Culture
The year 2002 was very crucial for the Pol’and’Rock Festival. The entire concert was filmed and used as footage and clips in a movie called The Woodstock station, The Loudest Film in Poland. This concert movie became a running legacy of Poland’s culture as it screened across movie theatres in the country. The movie participated in various international film festivals.
History
The first-ever concerts of the Pol’and’Rock Festival took place between 15 and 16 July in the year 1995 in the Czymanowo town near the Żarnowieckie Lake. Some of the highlights of the festival from that year included Zuki, Skankan, Ira, Urszula, among many others. It was a no-alcohol premise that added to the historic significance of the festival even more. Each year, the venues changed across Poland. However, Zary remained a constant spot from its third year up until 2003. The 1998 show was truly outstanding that saw the performances of nearly 50performing acts including Acid Drinkers and Akurat.
Over the years, the Pol’and’Rock Festival or the Woodstock Festival Poland has emerged as one of the most consistent and engaging ones out there. With artists and fans finding each other under the open sky, the festival is a huge addition to the collective cultural growth of the music industry. The festival will hopefully open its doors soon and bring to the audience fresh music once again.