Blanka Bednarz enjoys a versatile career as a soloist, recitalist, chamber musician, concertmaster and teacher. She has concertized in the USA, United Kingdom, Poland, Germany, Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands and Lithuania, at venues such as  the Jordan Hall in Boston, Miller Hall, Philadelphia Ethical Society, Kosciuszko Foundation House, Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall in New York, Aula UAM and White Hall in Poznan,  Lake Placid Center for the Arts, Cardiff City Hall, and at various prestigious festivals such as Highlands-Cashiers Chamber Music Festival, Chanterelle Festival, Mozart Festival in Poznan, Wieniawski Festival, Days of Szymanowski, International Chopin and Friends Festival in New York, etc. As soloist Bednarz has appeared with the Connecticut Virtuosi, the Georgia Southern Symphony, the Great Poland Symphony, Sinfonietta Polonia, the Gettysburg Chamber Orchestra, the New England Conservatory Honors Symphony and Chamber Orchestra (Bednarz was particularly influential in the establishment of the latter).

Bednarz’s playing has been hailed as “beautiful, mature and rich in color” (Gazeta Wyborcza, Poland). Bednarz is an avid chamber musician, performing in a variety of settings and with renowned artists, such as: Rita Sloan, Barry Snyder, Richard Stolzman, Adrian Levine, William Ransom, Joanna Kurkowicz, Daniel Veis, Roeland Hendrix, Eddie Gomez, Timothy Deighton, Heng-Jin Park, Ning An, Sergei Schepkin, Martin Storey, the Corigliano Quartet, the award winning Chameleon Arts Ensemble of Boston, and Alarm Will Sound. In 2007 Bednarz was invited to join the accomplished Vega Quartet for a residency with the Piedmont Symphony (NC) and subsequently as first violinist with Vega Quartet-in-residence at Emory University in Atlanta GA (2007-08).

Bednarz is a member of the Atma Trio (www.atmatrio.org) established in 2002 with cellist Cheung Chau, and pianist Slawomir Dobrzanski). The ensemble’s performances consistently meet with critical acclaim. Gazeta Wyborcza praised, for instance, Bednarz’s “passionate performance and artistic maturity.”  A reviewer of the Radio Merkury noted  of Atma Trio that “these are excellent musicians who truly know what it means to play chamber music.” The Trio performed under the auspices of the Szymanowski and Hofmann Associations, A. Kawecka Foundation, in venues and at festivals such as the National Museum of Instruments, the Baltic Sea Culture Center, the White Hall, Wielkopolskie Centrum Chopinowskie, the Wieniawski Festival, the Days of Szymanowski Festival, the Mozart Festival, etc. The Trio broke several attendance records in Poland, performing also in Lithuania, Germany, and Sweden. In the US, the trio performed under the auspices of the Chopin Foundation of the US in Miami, at Lawrence Conservatory, at numerous universities, at the Chopin and Friends Festival in NYC, etc. The trio has been heard on Radio Merkury and Radio Emaus, as well as television stations  in Poznan and Wroclaw. The Trio’s series Atma Trio and Friends has been sought after.

As a member of the Huntington Piano Trio Bednarz performed at the Carnegie Hall's Weill Recital Hall, on Boston's WGBH Radio and concert series, and on Polish Radio. Tygodnik Podhalanski described the trio’s performance as ‘beautifully sensitive,’ and the Boston Globe praised its “eloquent” rendition of Kirchner’s Second Trio.

As orchestral musician Bednarz played with the Kansas City Chamber Orchestra, Wichita Symphony Orchestra, Boston Modern Orchestra Project (participating in several recording projects), Sibelius Academy Orchestra, etc. She is concertmaster of Sinfonietta Polonia, a unique orchestral training program she and her husband/conductor Cheung Chau established in Poland. The orchestra has been highly praised and noted (see www.sinfoniettapolonia.pl). It has been featured on TVP Poznan, Leszno Television, and has been heard on Radio Merkury and Radio Emaus). Bednarz’s discography includes CDs: with music by R. Y. Glawlick (Capstone Records, 2003, earning the opinion of “excellent performances” in a review in Fanfare Magazine); Huntington Piano Trio (A. W. Promotions label, 1999), Mozart’s Flute Quartets (released and highly praised by Twoja Muza, 2007); with E. Murawska, M. Murawski, C. Chau); a CD with Mendelssohn’s Trio in d minor and Ravel’s Trio in a minor, Atma Trio (on leading Polish label Acte Préalable, 2007, AP0172), a CD with works by Palester/Klecki (with Pierre-Ives Artaud, Ewa Murawska, Marcin Murawski, Cheung Chau and Sinfonietta Polonia;  Acte Préalable, 2008, APO181). Another disc of Gawlick’s chamber and solo music featuring Bednarz will be released in 2009. 

Bednarz won the first prize in the Naftzger Young Artist Competition, took the second prize at the Jefferson Symphony Concerto Competition in Denver and received numerous other awards and honors, including the Presser Foundation, Tourjée Alumni, Datatel Awards, and St. Botolph Foundation Grant . 

Bednarz is currently an Assistant Professor of Music at Dickinson College, PA. As first violinist of Vega Quartet she taught chamber music at Emory University in Atlanta, GA and coached ensembles in Vega Quartet  Youth Chamber music program. She was artist affiliate faculty at the Georgia Southern University (2007-08). She had served as a teaching assistant to Professor Rosenblith at the New England Conservatory, and had taught at the NEC Preparatory and Continuing Education School and Bethany College. She coached the NECCO with D. Palma and chamber ensembles at the International Musical Arts Institute (IMAI) in ME, premiere youth chamber program “Franklin Pond” and Centennial School orchestra camps in Atlanta. She is a member of the string faculty at International-Musical-Institute-and-Festival in MD. She has also given master classes at NEC, for College and Preparatory Divisions, and at the University of Kansas, Lawrence Conservatory, Messiah College, Mercer Univ., Wichita State Univ., Penn State, etc. Bednarz’s students have won concerto competitions and have gone on to studying violin performance at institutions such as NYU, Longy School of Music, Catholic Univ., etc.

Dr. Bednarz is a graduate of “Talent School” (Poznan, Poland, with Jadwiga Kaliszewska), University of Kansas (BM summa cum laude, with Ben Sayevich), New England Conservatory (on full scholarship, MM summa cum laude, DMA, with Eric Rosenblith, Michele Auclair and viola with James Dunham). Her coaches were members of the Cleveland, Guarneri, Cavani, Ying and Borromeo Quartets, Patricia Zander, James Buswell, Leon Kirchner, and the late Eugene Lehner, etc.

In 2007-08 Bednarz performed in numerous concerts with the Vega Quartet (incl. at the Highlands-Cashiers Chamber music Festival). Atma Trio presented concerts in Poland and Germany, in “Music At First” series in PA, at Kansas State Univ.,  in Beethoven’s Triple Concerto with the Connecticut Virtuosi. With pianist Matthew Bengtson, Bednarz presented an all-Szymanowski program at the Philadelphia Ethical Society (under the auspices of the Kosciuszko Foundation). In 2008-09 season and subsequent seasons Bednarz performs with Atma Trio in KS, GA, Poland, US, UK (London), Israel and Egypt (among others in program “Kunst macht frei”), and with Sinfonietta Polonia.

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