Jerzy and Lidia Owsiak fell in love in high school. The founder of the Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity does not want to remember about a certain event from the beginning of their relationship
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Loading... - Mendoza Bonita
- 16 Feb 2023
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GOCC is Owsiak, Owsiak is GOCC. The charismatic leader of the Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity devoted his entire life to it. He created a charity campaign, which over the years has become the pride of Poles and unique on a global scale.
Jerzy Owsiak celebrates his birthday on October 6. The founder of the Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity was born in 1953 in Gdańsk . The Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity probably would not have existed if Jerzy Owsiak had not started cooperation with public television in the early 1990s. In December 1991, he began to prepare a program for TVP2 "Róbta what you want, or a rock and roll ride without holding", today having a cult status.
It was during the Christmas holidays of that year that the name "Wielka Orkiestra Świątecznej Pomocy" was first mentioned - during a charity fundraiser initiated by Owsiak on the air.
— Before that, we had not even thought about establishing the Foundation, and the first fundraiser was organized based on the needs of children's cardiosurgery at the Children's Health Center in Warsaw. It was there that there was a foundation that had been collecting money for the purchase of specialized medical equipment for some time - said the leader of the Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity.
The culmination of the first collection was the final organized in a television studio and broadcast on January 3, 1993. The equivalent of USD 1.5 million was collected, and the generosity of Poles surpassed the wildest expectations of the organizers. It was then that Owsiak, together with a group of his closest associates, decided to establish the Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity and to organize campaigns on a regular basis.
Who is Jerzy Owsiak?
How did Owsiak find himself on television, thanks to which he was able to start the Orchestra? An activist from Gdańsk in the 1980s, thanks to his acquaintance with the musician Wojciech Waglewski, he moved around the music community and organized concerts around the band Voo Voo.
When Waglewski was invited to the Scout Radio, he offered Owsiak a joint interview. Owsiak liked the audience so much that he was invited to the radio studio once more, and over time he got his own broadcasts. This is how his adventure with the media began - from Rozglo Scouts he went to Polish Radio, and at the same time he started the aforementioned cooperation with TVP, which lasted until 2007. He also performed on the waves of Radio Wawa and Antyradia.
In the early 1990s, together with Walter Chełstowski, he managed the Festival in Jarocin twice. Owsiak did not hide that in his youth he belonged to a group of Mazovian hippies and was fascinated by this subculture. Thanks to this, in 1995 he began to organize Przystanek Woodstock (today's Pol'and'Rock Festival), referring to the name of the legendary American festival from 1969. Read More…
