Poland’s most prestigious music awards ceremony, Fryderyki 2025 took place in the Tauron Arena in Kraków, and was the culmination of a celebration that spanned the country. Organised by the Association of Audio-Video Producers and the Phonographic Academy, this huge celebration of Polish music took place in three different cities. In March, nominees in the jazz categories gathered in the Polin Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw. A week later, Katowice and the Polish Radio National Symphony Orchestra held the awards for Classical music. The event concluded with the Gala of Popular Music at the Tauron Arena that mixed dozens of live performances with special guests and presenters – all broadcast live.
Sound for the show was built around DiGiCo consoles, with four Quantum 338s for front of house and monitor mixing, plus an addition Quantum 225 dedicated to public speaking and host mixes.
The system was supplied by Brawlers, the audio production company owned by Remigiusz Kasztelnik, who was also on site to produce the audio for the event.
In order to manage this high-profile evening, the audio was split into zones, designated A and B, each managed by a single engineer at FOH and another in monitor world, both mixing on Quantum 338s. This structure proved essential in managing the high channel count, frequent changeovers and last-minute schedule shifts of this fast-paced evening.
The FOH mix for Zone A was handled by Piotr Szreder, with David Atamaniuk in Zone B. Each worked within their own zone, but were connected via a fibre-loop and co-ordinated routing. This ensured the engineers for both Zones were able to call-up any mix source instantly, while monitor engineers, Piotr ‘PacMan’ Pac-Pomarnacki and Sławek ‘Guadky’ Gładyszewski could work independently to meet the needs of each artist.
‘The Quantum series gives us the headroom and routing freedom to do these kinds of shows without breaking a sweat,’ Szreder says. ‘You can tell these consoles were designed with productions like this in mind. The high channel counts, layered control, Macros, and powerful Snapshots are all essential features for our work.’
The wide variety of performances ranging from full bands to acoustic duos, and included orchestral features. A highlight was the triumphant performance of Edyta Bartosiewicz’s hit ‘Sen’ accompanied by the Beethoven Orchestra. The engineers managed the rapid scenes with Snapshots, storing each scene to aid in the quick-fire changeovers, a method that meant the engineers could reset in seconds.
‘From pre-show rehearsals to final broadcast, the DiGiCo Quantum platform delivered exceptional performance throughout Fryderyki 2025,’ Atamaniuk reports. ‘Backed by the experience and coordination of Brawlers, and led by producer Remigiusz Kasztelnik, the sound system handled one of the most complex musical productions in Poland with elegance and ease.’
Each zone used individual SD-Racks; Zone A included one SD-Rack and a SD-Mini Rack. Zone B used two SD-Racks, connected via The Optocore loop and fully redundant across an HMA fibre infrastructure. This closed-loop structure enabled real-time routing between consoles and racks, allowing for low-latency communication between engineers working FOH and monitors.
The Quantum 225 dealt with the spoken word presentations as a stand-alone system. Managed by Piotr Mastalerski, this system handled presentations from host, Gabi Drzewiecka, a music journalist and television personality, plus many more guest appearances.
At FOH, both zones implemented Waves SoundGrid Extreme servers, integrated with the Quantum 338s. These provided dynamic processing using third-party plug-ins for vocal shaping, compression, EQ and spatial effects. This was useful for the live television broadcast, allowing quick adaptation to voice and performance types while maintaining broadcast sound quality.
‘Whether it was a high-octane rock act, a pop ballad, or a presenter’s heartfelt speech, each word and note was exactly where it needed to be,’ Kasztelnik says. ‘With DiGiCo at the heart of the audio system, the team mixed it all like clockwork.’
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