Meet the composers of “Mondprinzessin” (Kaguya-Hime) - #3 Henryk Mikołaj Górecki

Henryk Mikołaj Górecki

Three Pieces in an Old Style - Henryk Mikołaj Górecki

As the title suggests, the work refers to the style of the old ages, a characteristic which first appeared in Górecki's music in the 1960s. The inspiration was provided by papers on old Polish music which had been published in the magazines "Muzyka" and "Ruch Muzyczny" in 1958-61 and included Karol Hławiczka's series "Ze studiów nad muzyką polskiego Odrodzenia" / "From the Studies of the Polish Renaissance Music". Hławiczka discussed, among other music, two songs about the life of King Sigismund August. The one which Górecki utilized in the third of his Three Pieces in an Old Style by borrowing the tune of the tenor voice was a four-voice anonymous 16th century song Pieśń o weselu najjaśniejszego króla Sygmunta wtórego / Song on the Wedding of His Majesty King Sigismund the Secondo.

All three pieces use modal elements, the melodies of nos. 1 and 3 using only the "white keys" and no. 1 written in the eolian scale. The archaic elements are combined with folk ones, the second piece being in fact a folk dance.

This is what Tadeusz Zieliński wrote about the Three Pieces:

"The intentionally simple yet delectable releasing of the purely sonoristic characteristics of string sounds, the differentiating and contrasting of their thickness and dynamics take us right to the core of Górecki's individual style. This music is a modest sample of that style and of the typical esthetic and of the composer's technical conundrums, but although seemingly simplified and adjusted to the 'archaic' theme, it is impressive and charming" (Tadeusz A. Zieliński, the programme of the 1975 Warsaw Autumn Festival, p.118).

Prepared by the Polish Music Information Center, Polish Composers' Union, May 2004.  

https://culture.pl/en/work/three-pieces-in-an-old-style-henryk-mikolaj-gorecki