Anastasiya Niakrasava

Ethnomusicologist, singer and educator. Graduate of first- and second-cycle programmes at the musicology, University of Warsaw, and Tank Pedagogical University in Minsk. In 2022 she completed her doctoral programme and is working on a doctoral thesis devoted to the musical culture of Polish minority in the Grodno region (tutor: Prof. dr hab. Piotr Dahlig).
She completed courses at the international summer school of the Charles University in Prague, Bachelor’s field of study, Liberal Arts and Humanities: “Contemporary Issues in Ethnomusicology “and “(Ethnomusicological) Method from the Ground Up – Methodology as Construct”. She did internships at the Phonographic Archive of the Institute of Art, Polish Academy of Sciences, and the Music Department of the University of Warsaw Library.

Research interests: minority and borderland culture, socio-political determinants of people’s musical activities, vocal techniques and performance practices of traditional rural repertoire.

Participant in and organiser of many field research trips to Belarus, Poland, Russia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Participant in projects of the Institute of Art, Polish Academy of Sciences, as part of grant programmes of the National Programme for the Development of Humanities, leader of original research and artistic-educational projects under programmes of the Institute of Music and Dance, and Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. In 2022 leader of a Ministry of Education and Science project entitled: “Using the results of ethnomusicological research in teaching and artistic projects” under the programme “Social responsibility of science” (grant no. SONP/SP/513836/2021). She has presented the results of her research at national and international conferences as well as in scholarly and popular periodicals. An important element of her scholarly activity is the popularisation and application of research results in teaching and social practices.

Beneficiary of the Stefan Banach Programme (2015–2019), and scholarship of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage for artists and popularisers of culture (2020). Winner of an award in the competition for the best foreign student in Poland “Interstudent 2017” (“Perspektywy” Foundation). Winner of awards at numerous Polish and international festivals. Winner of the Anna Kiełbusiewicz Award for the best singer (2008) and the Czesław Niemen Award for the band FolkRoll &Nasta Niakrasava granted by the Minister of Culture and National Heritage in the “New Tradition” Folk Music Competition (Polish Radio, 2009).

She conducts classes and workshops for many educational and cultural institutions, including the Fryderyk Chopin Institute, Bemowo Culture Centre, “Music is for Everyone” Foundation, Polish Ethnomusicological Seminar, and Festival of Science (Warsaw) For many years she has been collaborating with the “Jestem” Foundation, which works with people with chronic and incurable illnesses, also as part of music therapy classes at the Institute of Musicology, University of Warsaw.

Positions (University of Warsaw): representative for the USOS system at the Institute of Musicology (2022 – present), coordinator for remote exams at the Institute of Musicology (2020 – present), secretary during meeting of the Board Faculty of Culture and Arts (2020 – present), secretary of the Academic Council of theInstitute of Musicology (2016–2020), representative of doctoral students in the Teaching Commission of the Institute of Musicology (2017–2020), chair of the Ethnomusicology Student Research Club (2012–2014).

Courses conducted at the Institute of Musicology, University of Warsaw (various periods): Introduction to musicology (practicals), Musical language of communication in traditional cultures (tutorials), Music therapy I and II (practicals), Ethnomusicology Unit Workshop (tutorials), Traditional singing workshops (her own original courses devoted to vocal techniques of Polesie, Podlasie, Suwałki region, Smolensk Dnieper region and Neman region). In the 2021/2022 academic year an initiative of University of Warsaw students – participants in the “Traditional songs from the Neman region” classes – led to the creation of a singing group, which won at award in the “Old Tradition” contest (2022) and began to give concerts.