There are September afternoons when summer seems reluctant to leave. The light grows softer, the evenings arrive earlier, yet something of August’s warmth still lingers in the air. This is the atmosphere evoked by the title of the concert “Sensommarens blommor” – “Flowers of Late Summer.”
At Barockhallen in Historiska museet in Stockholm, two remarkable musicians come together as Duo Adoranna: Anna Nuzha on cello and Dorota Zarowiecka on piano. The concert forms part of the museum’s musical programme, bringing live music into one of Stockholm’s most evocative historical settings. What makes this meeting particularly compelling is that both musicians bring to the stage not only technical mastery, but also substantial artistic histories.
Anna Nuzha is an internationally accomplished Ukrainian cellist, soloist, chamber musician and improviser. She has been described as one of Ukraine’s leading cellists and holds the distinction of Honored Artist of Ukraine. Her professional path has also included teaching at major music institutions in Ukraine and artistic leadership connected with chamber music.
Her artistry extends far beyond the traditional concert hall. Nuzha has explored theatre and interdisciplinary performance in both Ukraine and Sweden, using the cello almost as a dramatic character capable of expressing emotion, gesture and narrative. That theatrical sensitivity may explain why her playing can feel so intensely communicative — as though the instrument were not simply producing sound, but speaking.
Her personal story has also become intertwined with the recent history of Europe. After leaving Lviv following the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, she continued her artistic life in Sweden. In 2023 she performed in Stockholm’s Royal Chapel in connection with the anniversary of the invasion, in the presence of the Swedish Royal Family.
Beside her at the piano is Dorota Żarowiecka, a Swedish pianist of Polish origin whose artistic career has for many years formed part of Stockholm’s classical music landscape. Born in Warsaw and living in Sweden since 1981, Dorota has become particularly associated with the promotion of Polish classical music. Her repertoire has included works by Fryderyk Chopin, Stanisław Moniuszko, Ignacy Jan Paderewski and Karol Szymanowski, and she has been recognised for both artistic and technical excellence. She has also received an artistic award acknowledging her contribution to Polish musical culture in Sweden.
Her connection with Chopin is especially worth mentioning. She has appeared in dedicated Chopin programmes in Stockholm, including concerts commemorating the composer’s legacy, demonstrating a sensitivity to repertoire in which intimacy, poetry and virtuosity must coexist.
Dorota Żarowiecka is also an experienced pedagogue. Her professional history includes teaching piano at Nordiska Musikgymnasiet in Stockholm, adding another dimension to an artistic career built not only around performance, but also around passing musical knowledge to another generation.
There is something particularly captivating about the combination of these two instruments — and these two artistic personalities.
The cello can speak almost with a human voice: melancholic, profound and filled with longing, yet moments later warm and deeply intimate. The piano creates space around it, shaping rhythm, atmosphere and drama. Sometimes it leads; at other times it steps back, allowing the other instrument to tell its story. But chamber music requires something beyond technical perfection. It requires a conversation. Not one carried by words, but by glances, breath and the brief silences between notes. In a duo, every gesture becomes part of the narrative, and the emotion exchanged between the musicians reaches the audience as well.
And perhaps this is where Nuzha and Żarowiecka complement one another so naturally: one brings the deeply vocal, almost theatrical quality of the cello, while the other carries a pianist’s sense of architecture, colour and musical memory.
The setting itself gives the concert another dimension. Historiska museet is a place devoted to history and memory, while music belongs above all to the present moment. A sound appears, exists for an instant and then disappears.Perhaps that is why music reminds us so strongly of time. Of its fleeting nature, but also of the importance of experiencing fully what is happening now.
The title “Flowers of Late Summer” can also be understood metaphorically. The flowers that bloom at the end of summer are different from those of spring. They carry a certain maturity and intensity, together with a subtle awareness that the season is changing.
Life can be much the same.
Not everything beautiful has to happen at the beginning of the journey. Some of the most meaningful encounters, discoveries and experiences appear precisely when one season slowly begins to give way to another.
Perhaps that is also why September feels so naturally connected with music.
It reminds us that the ending of one season is not an ending at all.
It is simply a change of rhythm.
2026.09.13 Stockholm
Halina Rosa
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