Polish composer Henryk Górecki passed away on Friday 12th November 2010 after a long illness. Górecki was a peripheral figure in the contemporary classical music world whose music was known only to connoisseurs, until 1991, when a recording of his Symphony No. 3 – the Symphony of Sorrowful Songs – was released to commemorate the victims of the holocaust. The piece – and particularly that recording of it – became immensely popular around the world and sold well over a million copies – which is amazing for a modern classical CD.
Critics reacted with hostility to its success, suggesting that people were buying the CD in order to have it as background music while they sat drinking wine at home. I can’t speak for anyone else, of course, but although I don’t understand the words of the songs that are incorporated in it except by reading the sleeve note, I still find it extremely moving and listen to it regularly. I’m not very good at bandwagons, cultural or otherwise, but this was one I’m glad I jumped on.
Górecki himself said
Many of my family died in concentration camps. I had a grandfather who was in Dachau, an aunt in Auschwitz. You know how it is between Poles and Germans. But Bach was a German too—and Schubert, and Strauss. Everyone has his place on this little earth.
That’s a good thing to ponder this Remembrance Sunday as you listen to the following excerpt from the Symphony of Sorrowful Songs (which was in fact written in 1976, but not recorded commercially until 15 years later).
In the Dark 