Kryzysztof Penderecki - Penderecki: Symphony 8 - Dies Irae / Aus Den Psalmen Davids
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Artist: Kryzysztof PendereckiConductor: Antoni Wit
Orchestra: Warsaw National Philharmonic Orchestra
Performer: Michaela Kaune
Edition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 2008-01-29
Music Label: Naxos
Soundtracks:
- Nachts
- Ende Des Herbstes
- Bei Einer Kinde
- Flieder
- Fruhlingsnacht
- Ende Des Herbstes
- Sag' Ich Euch, Geliebte Baume?
- Im Nebel
- Verganglichkeit
- Ende Des Herbstes
- Herbsttag
- O Gruner Baum Des Lebens
- Lamentatio
- Apocalypsis
- Apotheosis
- Psalm 28
- Psalm 30
- Psalm 43
- Psalm 143
Free Music Notes for Penderecki: Symphony 8 - Dies Irae / Aus Den Psalmen Davids
Free Music Review: Penderecki on Naxos
Hit: 5 Stars
The Polish composer Krzystof Penderecki (b. 1933) began his career as a modernist composer, but in the 1970s experienced a "return to Romanticism" as did some of his contemporaries. Penderecki has recently composed two large-scale choral symphonies: the lengthy Symphony no. 7, the "Seven Gates of Jerusalem", available on a separate Naxos CD, and the Symphony no. 8, which receives its first recording on this CD, composed in 2005. This music is performed by Antoni Wit conducting the Warsaw National Philharmonic Choir with soprano, mezzo-soprano and baritone soloists. In his recent review of the recording for Classics Today, David Hurwitz observes that Wit "summons terrific playing from the orchestra, has a brilliant and enthusiastic choir at his disposal, and has assembled a very impressive team of soloists." The CD is part of a cycle of Penderecki's large-scale works conducted by Wit for Naxos.
The symphony no. 8 called "Lieder der Verganglichkeit" or "Songs of Transience" is in 12 movements each of which sets a poem or stanza by a German romantic poet, including Eichendorff, Rilke, Karl Kraus, Hesse, Goethe, and Achim von Arnim. The poems sing of transience and change in human life and in nature. Many of the movements are elegaic and reflective. Penderecki makes full use of the orchestra to establish the mood of the poems, including extensive use of bells and lower brass, meditative solos for the flute (no. 2) oboe (no. 3), English horn (no. 5), and bass trumpet (nos. 10 and 12). The poems and music speak of the inevitability of change, both in the sense of loss and of isolation, but also in the sense of human renewal and aspiration. Declamatory passages for the soloists alternate with choral sections. In the lengthy final poem, "O Green Tree of Life" by von Arnim, the three soloists sing together, for the only moment in the work, in a hymn to the hope for immortality in the human heart as an antidote to the change and pain of life. This is the climactic moment of the symphony and gives it a distinctively religious cast. In his "Classics Today" review, Hurwitz described this symphony as "among Penderecki's finest recent creations" and stated that "I could easily see it becoming a repertory item." The symphony is a moving work which is immediately accessible.
This CD also includes two works from Penderecki's modernist period. The "Dies irae" dates from 1967 and was composed to commemorate the victims of Auschwitz. This work is in three movements and, in spite of its modernist character, is also of an immediate appeal. The work sets biblical texts together with portions of the Eumenides by Aeschylus in giving a musically apt portrayal of the horrors of the camps. The work includes soprano and bass soloists, but much of the power of the music derives from the chorus which alternatively declaims, screams, and whispers its anguish. The climax of the work occurs at the close of the second movement with shrieks from the orchestra, frezied singing, and the wail of a siren.
The final work on this CD, "From the Psalms of David" dates from 1958 and is in four brief movements. The work is in a modernist vein and it is characterized by intense and shifting rhythms which mirror the original Hebrew texts. The second movement is a moving, archaic contrapuntal setting for chorus alone.
Richard Whitehouse wrote informative performance notes for this CD. Unfortunately texts of the poems are not included, but the texts and translations for the symphony no. 8 and for the psalms are available on the Naxos website. This CD received a well-deserved rating of 10/10 in the Classics Today review I mentioned earlier. It constitutes an ideal introduction to Penderecki's music.
Robin Friedman
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