Formula Indie Sessions _ Interview with Pianotherapist

Pianotherapist (Tomasz Wielechowski) is a pianist and music producer from Poland, born in 1990. He earned a Master’s degree in Jazz Piano from the Academy of Music in Katowice.

In addition to composing his own piano miniatures, he has been collaborating for many years with a large company in the in-store radio industry, for which he has produced around 500 tracks across various genres.

As a pianist and composer/producer, he has also participated in theatre productions staged in Warsaw theatres. He has collaborated with various musical ensembles, performing both in Poland and internationally.

For the past 11 years, he has also been actively involved in music education.

What is your earliest memory connected to music?

When I was about three years old, my aunt used to listen to Bryan Adams. I remember how much joy I got from spinning around wildly to his songs. I would spin so fast that I lost my balance and felt like I was going to throw up — but after a moment, once I regained my balance, I’d get up and start spinning all over again. 😄

How did your passion for creating music begin?

My journey into improvised music and my passion for creating began in church. I belong to a small Protestant minority in predominantly Catholic Poland. I started attending music school at the age of six, but I didn’t enjoy the classical music I was required to play there.

At church, there was a man who played the piano during services. When I was around 10 or 11 years old, I began looking over his shoulder and noticed that his sheet music for church songs looked completely different from my classical scores. I asked him why, and that’s when he explained to me that something called improvisation existed, and he tried to explain — as much as you can to a ten-year-old — what it was all about.

He also gave me cassette tapes (something younger generations today probably don’t even recognize) with gospel music — Polish, European, and American. I started listening to the Polish gospel choir TGD, the Oslo Gospel Choir, and Mahalia Jackson. I fell in love with that music, and that’s when I realized that jazz improvisation on the piano was what I wanted to do in life.

When my father saw that I was fascinated by jazz, he also gave me albums by John Coltrane, Miles Davis, and some New Orleans jazz. That’s where my fascination began — and it continues to this day. 😊

What’s the story behind your current music project?

When I graduated from the Academy of Music with a Master’s degree, I found myself feeling frustrated. I had the degree, but I still didn’t know how to create a complete song on my own from start to finish. I knew how to write a topline, chords, and arrangements, but I had no idea about recording and production.

At that point, I decided to take private lessons with a friend of mine and an excellent trance music producer, Matt Bukovski. He personally loves trance and creates it in his own projects, but he also graduated in composition from the Academy of Music in Warsaw and is capable of producing virtually anything. I’m very grateful to him for everything — in fact, thanks to the knowledge he shared with me, I was eventually able to buy my own apartment. 🙂

In any case, he was the one who introduced me to the Spotify ecosystem, playlists, and how it all works. That’s when I decided to start recording a piano-focused project, because for me — as a trained jazz pianist — it felt very natural and relatively easy to create.

How would you describe your sound to someone who has never heard your music before?

I would describe it as soft, post-classical piano miniatures with a meditative character — sometimes more optimistic, sometimes more sentimental. They carry strong influences from contemporary popular music, but are aimed more at easy listening rather than creating highly advanced or challenging modern compositions.

In other words, I wanted to create short pieces that would be accessible to everyone.

What is one thing you’ve learned that completely changed the way you make music?

Expressing your own identity through music. It may sound obvious, but when you spend 17 years studying in state music schools, the education focuses heavily on deeply analyzing the work of famous musicians. As a result, it’s easy to lose your own clear artistic identity.

My high school teacher — the renowned Polish jazz pianist Andrzej Jagodziński — once told me:

“Don’t pretend you’re Black, because you’re not. You’re a Slav, with a lyrical soul, from the country where Chopin was born. Don’t try to play like Wynton Kelly or McCoy Tyner. Play like yourself. Don’t lie, because people will notice.”

What tools, instruments, or software are essential in your creative process?

There are plenty of tools like that. I use Splice a lot, and my favorite DAW is Ableton. As Pianotherapist, I also often recorded an acoustic piano using microphones.

Which indie artist or song are you loving right now?

My favorite indie piano pieces can be found on my Spotify playlist called Piano Therapy, which I update quite regularly. Recently, I’ve particularly enjoyed listening to artists such as Saah, Rasmus H. Thomsen, Adrien de la Salle, Timo Zobel, Virginio Aiello, and many others.

I’m in personal contact with many of the artists featured on my playlist, which makes the experience more meaningful. It’s always great to see that someone I’ve connected with personally has released a new piece. I’ve been following some of their careers from the very beginning, and that gives me hope that one day I might reach similar numbers myself.

How have your personal experiences influenced your music and artistic vision?

My music is constantly inspired by the world around me and the emotions I experience. After all, I’m a jazz musician, so I simply play what I feel in any given moment.

What emotions or messages do you hope listeners take from your work?

I’d like my listeners to simply take a break from the noise of the modern world through my music. Listening to piano music is calming. I’m also happy to see how popular this kind of music has become worldwide. The largest Spotify playlist dedicated to this style has over 7 million followers.

 What’s the most important lesson music has taught you so far?

Music has taught me, above all, how to manage my time and achieve set goals within specific deadlines. In music school, there is an exam every six months where you have to perform a prescribed program.

It has also helped me overcome the fear of speaking or performing in front of large audiences, whether talking to people or playing for them. I would recommend music lessons to all parents for their children, because they build habits that carry over into many other areas of life.

Music has taught me that you cannot fake it. Today, many people look for ways to make money through mediocrity — something easy, fast, and profitable. But music school exams are unforgiving. You step on stage, perform your program, and receive a score. No one cares whether you come from a wealthy or poor family, whether someone close to you has just died, or whether your partner has left you. Only the level of your performance matters.

In today’s world, where there is a clear tendency to overprotect children and avoid placing any demands on them, music education may seem politically incorrect — but it is also incredibly valuable, because it teaches real life. When these children later enter the job market, their boss will not care about their problems, only about results. It is harsh, but in my opinion it is both valuable and beautiful.

Music equalizes everyone — regardless of race, religion, or financial status. You step on stage, and either you deliver the required level or you don’t. Nothing else matters.

What is a dream venue or festival you would love to perform at?

As Pianotherapist, I could perform anywhere, as long as it allows me to establish a real connection with the audience. Apart from that project, most of my dreams are already largely fulfilled.

I’m a somewhat unusual musician, because I don’t really enjoy traveling. I perform in a theatre in Warsaw, and that in itself is the realization of my dream. There is direct contact with the audience, actors improvising on stage, and my spontaneously created musical backdrop as well as improvised songs.

It’s an improvised theatre production of “Wesele” at the Capitol Theatre. The audience actively participates in shaping the course of the performance in real time. It’s a fantastic experience, and that’s exactly what I enjoy most.

And as Pianotherapist? I would also most prefer to perform in Warsaw — it doesn’t matter whether it’s a large hall or a small one. The only thing that matters is having an emotional ping-pong between me and the audience: I share emotion with them, and they send energy back. That, in my opinion, is what a good performance is all about.

If you could collaborate with any artist, past or present, who would it be and why?

I’d like to find a good male voice in Poland. There aren’t many strong male vocalists here. I’d love to collaborate with one on a production project and create pop songs together.

I really admire the way Gareth sings, and I’d like to find someone in Poland who could perform Polish lyrics just as beautifully. Maybe it will happen one day. 😊

Where can our listeners follow and support your music? (Website,Spotify, IG, links)

Spotify:

IG:

Looking toward the future, what’s your dream for the next chapter of your musical journey?

I’d like to complete a pop project with a strong male Polish vocal (as I mentioned earlier). I would also be happy to produce music for a theatre production or a film.

As Pianotherapist, I want to release music more regularly, because I have to honestly admit that I’ve somewhat neglected my profile for various reasons. However, I have a student who is 11 years old, and she started reproaching me for not releasing anything. She actually found me on Spotify herself — I never told her I was recording music. In a very childlike way, she began insisting that I finally release something new, and it was she who motivated me to restart my activity as Pianotherapist. 😀

What do you hope listeners will discover about you along the way?

My music isn’t meant to be about me, but about them — the listeners. I want it to serve them well every day: to help them fall asleep after a difficult day, or gently fill the silence of a Sunday morning. To help them slow down, even if just for a moment, and calm their nerves before new challenges.

If you want here you can add a representative Youtube video to insert below the interview 🙂

YouTube isn’t my favorite platform, and I don’t have a particularly polished profile there, so I’m simply sharing a link to my latest track.