Krzysztof Penderecki edit
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Krzysztof Penderecki edit
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| Krzysztof Penderecki | |
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 Krzysztof Penderecki, Gdańsk, 2008
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| Background information | |
| Born | November 23, 1933 Dębica, Poland |
| Origin | Kraków, Poland |
| Genres | Classical music |
| Occupations | Composer, conductor |
| Years active | 1953–present |
| Website | http://www.krzysztofpenderecki.eu/ |
Krzysztof Penderecki (Polish pronunciation: [ˈkʂɨʂtɔf pɛndɛˈrɛtski], born November 23, 1933 in Dębica) is a Polish composer and conductor of classical music.
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After taking private composition lessons with Franciszek Skolyszewski, Penderecki studied music at Jagiellonian University and the Academy of Music in Krakow under Artur Malawski and Stanislaw Wiechowicz. Having graduated in 1958, he took up a teaching post at the Academy. Penderecki's early works show the influence of Anton Webern and Pierre Boulez (he has also been influenced by Igor Stravinsky). Penderecki's international recognition began in 1959 at the Warsaw Autumn with the premieres of the works Strophen, Psalms of David, and Emanations, but the piece that truly brought him to international attention was Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima (see threnody and atomic bombing of Hiroshima), written for 52 string instruments. In it, Penderecki makes use of extended instrumental techniques (for example, playing on the "wrong" side of the bridge, bowing on the tailpiece). There are many novel textures in the work, which makes great use of tone clusters. He originally titled the work 8' 37", perhaps in a nod to John Cage, but then decided to dedicate it to the victims of Hiroshima.
Fluorescences followed a year later, increasing the orchestral density by adding more wind and brass and an enormous percussion section of 32 instruments for six players, which included a Mexican güiro, typewriters, gongs and other exotic non-standard instruments. The piece was composed for the Donaueschingen Festival of contemporary music of 1962, and its performance was regarded as highly provocative and controversial. Penderecki's intentions at this stage were quite Cagean: 'All I'm interested in is liberating sound beyond all tradition'.1 This preoccupation with sound culminated in De Natura Sonoris I, a piece which frequently called upon the orchestra to use non-standard playing techniques to produce different sounds and colours, often very different in character. A sequel to the original was composed in 1971, with a more limited orchestra, and it incorporates more elements of post-Romanticism than its predecessor. This foreshadowed Penderecki's renunciation of the avant-garde in the mid-1970s, although both pieces feature dramatic glissandos, dense clusters, and a use of harmonics, and unusual instruments (the musical saw features in the second piece).
| Year | Song title | Work | Instrumentation |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1968: | "Miserere mei, Deus" Listen (help·info) |
Saint Luke Passion | Chorus |
The St. Luke Passion (1963–66) brought Penderecki further popular acclaim, not least because it was a major and devoutly religious work, written in an avant-garde musical language, composed within Communist Eastern Europe. Western audiences saw it as a snub to the Soviet authorities and were keen to give it their support. Various different musical styles can be seen in the piece. The experimental textures, such as were seen in the Threnody, are balanced by the baroque form of the work and the occasional use of more traditional harmonic and melodic writing. Penderecki makes use of serialism in this piece, and one of the tone rows he uses includes the BACH motif, which acts as a bridge between the conventional and more experimental elements. The Stabat Mater section towards the end of the piece concludes on a simple major chord of D major, and this gesture is repeated at the very end of the work, which finishes on a triumphant E major chord. These are the only tonal harmonies in the work, and both come as a surprise to the listener; Penderecki's use of tonal triads such as these remains a controversial aspect of the work.
Penderecki continued to write pieces that explored the sacred in music, such as Dies Irae, a version of the Magnificat, and Canticum Canticorum, a song of songs for chorus and orchestra from the early seventies.1
Around the mid-1970s, while he was a professor at the Yale School of Music 2 Penderecki's style began to change. The Violin Concerto No. 1 largely leaves behind the dense tone clusters with which he had been associated, and instead focuses on two melodic intervals: the semitone and the tritone. Some commentators went so far as to compare this new direction to Anton Bruckner. This direction continued with the Symphony No. 2, Christmas (1980), which is rather straightforward from a harmonic and melodic standpoint for a composer who had been one of the most experimental in Europe. It makes frequent use of the tune of the Christmas carol Silent Night.
Penderecki explained his shift by stating that he had come to feel that the experimentation of the avant-garde had gone too far from the expressive, non-formal qualities of Western music: 'The avant-garde gave one an illusion of universalism. The musical world of Stockhausen, Nono, Boulez and Cage was for us, the young - hemmed in by the aesthetics of socialist realism, then the official canon in our country - a liberation...I was quick to realise however, that this novelty, this experimentation and formal speculation, is more destructive than constructive; I realised the Utopian quality of its Promethean tone'. Penderecki concluded that he was 'saved from the avant-garde snare of formalism by a return to tradition'.1
In 1980, Penderecki was commissioned by Solidarity to compose a piece to accompany the unveiling of a statue at the Gdańsk shipyards to commemorate those killed at anti-government riots there in 1970. Penderecki responded with the Lacrimosa, which he later expanded into one of the best known works of his later period, the Polish Requiem (1980–84, 1993, 2005). Here again the harmonies are quite lush, although there are moments which evoke his earlier work in the 1960s. The tendency in recent years has been towards more traditionally conceived tonal constructs, as seen in works like the Cello Concerto No. 2 and the Credo. He conducted Credo on the occasion of the 70th birthday of Helmuth Rilling, 29 May 2003, with the Gächinger Kantorei and the Radio Symphony Orchestra Stuttgart, programmed with Bach's setting of these words in the Symbolum Nicenum from his Mass in B Minor.3
On the occasion of his 75th birthday he conducted three of his works and one of Tchaikovsky at the Rheingau Musik Festival 2008, De Profundis (from Seven Gates of Jerusalem), Ciaccona in memoria Giovanni Paolo II (from Polish Requiem) and Concerto per viola and orchestra, played by the Sinfonietta Cracovia.
Some of Penderecki's music has been adapted for film soundtracks. The Shining (1980) features six pieces of Penderecki's music: Utrenja II: Ewangelia, Utrenja II: Kanon Paschy, The Awakening of Jacob, De Natura Sonoris No. 1, De Natura Sonoris No. 2 and Polymorphia. The Exorcist (1973) features Polymorphia as well as his String Quartet and Kanon For Orchestra and Tape; fragments of the Cello Concerto and The Devils of Loudun are also used in the film. Writing about The Exorcist, the film critic for The New Republic wrote "even the music is faultless, most of it by Krzysztof Penderecki, who at last is where he belongs."4 David Lynch has used Penderecki's music in the soundtracks of the movies Wild at Heart (1990) and Inland Empire (2006). Penderecki's piece, Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima, was also used during one of the final sequences in the film Children of Men.
In 2001, Penderecki's Credo received the Grammy Award for best choral performance for the world-premiere recording made by the Oregon Bach Festival, which commissioned the piece. The same year, Penderecki was awarded with the Prince of Asturias Prize in Spain, one of the highest honours given in Spain to individuals, entities, organizations or others from around the world who make notable achievements in the sciences, arts, humanities, or public affairs. Penderecki received an honorary doctorate from the Seoul National University, Korea in 2005, as well as from the University of Münster, Germany in 2006. His notable students include Chester Biscardi and Walter Mays. Andrzej Wajda used some fragments of Penderecki's works in the 2007 film "Katyń".
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