Saturday, March 01, 2014

Górecki's Third Symphony



Henryk Górecki's Symphony No. 3, Op. 36 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs) was featured on the program of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra's recent concert. ISO music director, Krzysztof Urbański, himself a native of Poland, is a champion of his country's fellow musician/composers.  This program, for example, contained works by Polish composers Wojciech Kilar, Karol Szymanowski, and Górecki.  This symphony was written in 1976 but did not gain much recognition outside Poland until 1992 when a recording of it (featuring American soprano Dawn Upshaw) topped the classical charts in Britain and the United States. Since then, selections have found their way into movie scores.