"Gorecki in Context" at PAHA 75th Annual Meeting in Washington D.C. (January 2018)

Maja Trochimczyk presents Gorecki in Context. Photo by Marcin Szerle

The edited volume "Gorecki in Context: Essays on Music" (by Maja Trochimczyk, published in December 2017) had its public debut at the 75th Annual Meeting of the Polish American Historical Association in Washington, D.C.  The book was placed on display with other book by PAHA members, and was discussed during the paper by Dr. Maja Trochimczyk, entitled: "The Myth of the Third Symphony: Gorecki in California"

Photo by Marcin Szerle

The presentation focused on the performance history of the Third Symphony Symphony of Sorrowful Songs (composed in 1976, world-famous since the Nonesuch recording of 1992, and conducted by Gorecki himself in Los Angeles).  The author organized his visit and ensured that the composer, who was not thrilled about metropolitan performances, but rather interested in small-town ambience of "ordinary people" was comfortable and able to express his unique musical vision. 

Since the projector malfunctioned, the presentation became more traditional - with copies of the handout distributed among the audience. Among other aspects of the Third Symphony, its use of the lullaby as an expressive and melodic model was pointed out and illustrated by singing the Polish lullabies. Luckily, the audience did not go to sleep. 

The lullabies are characterized with limited melodic outlines, reduced to three or two notes, slow repeated motion, that may be associated with rocking a baby to sleep. The step-wise semitonal motion in Bzi-bzi-bzibziana is cited in the strings in the opening of the Third Movement of the Third Symphony.

Photo by Marcin Szerle

The audience was fascinated with Gorecki's views on the extremely slow and tranquil music in the Third Symphony - and quite difficult to perform in sustained way, without losing focus or intonation.  Dr. Trochimczyk cited Gorecki's words to USC Thornton School of Music students who played his work with dedication and attention to every detail. As a result, the composer was very pleased with their interpretation. The symphony clocked at 65 minutes, compared to typical 55-56 minutes length in other interpretations. The main difference stemmed from the much slower tempi in the monumental, arch=like first movement, consisting of two canons framing an entry of the solo soprano. 

The composer discussed in detail the general expressive character of the symphony as follows:

Movement No. 1, Lento sostenuto tranquillo ma cantabile (34’53’’): 

Górecki: "Some general remarks: Please sustain the half notes, without diminuendo, in a contemplative mood. It should all be sostenuto and very tranquil, very cantabile. That is all […] Did you practice this section slower or faster?" 

Students: "Faster!"   

Górecki: "Nonetheless, I would like to play it slower. This is the whole problem. […] Here, in this music, we have to surrender ourselves to this other dimension of time. We have to slow down. Only then the sonority will be fantastic: the higher the music will go, the more distinctly it will sound. I dream of writing such tranquil music. I do not want to compose anything that echoes the modern "rush" - the cell phones, the telephones and faxes. It has to be calm. Life is too beautiful to be wasted in this way, by rushing things so much. How should I explain it to you? Perhaps you should think about an elevator: you leave behind the basement of everyday life, filled with noises, distractions and anxieties, and you take the elevator up to the tenth floor, or even into the sky of timelessness. When you are in this music, time slows down, it is as if you were in heaven, it is like eternity. "

Movement No. 3, Lento cantabile – semplice (21’16’’)

Gorecki: "Let us now take a small "breathing space" so that you can understand my intentions. This is a mother's song. This song has to be expressed both by the orchestra and the soloist. It has to be contemplative in mood, but still maintain the tempo. It approximates the speed of slow walking, when one walks alone, lost in thought. We have to enter into this mood. It is as if we were walking, or even slowly dancing. You have to think about walking here."

  

"For me it is a very difficult movement because I do not usually engage in conducting and I do not know how to enchant you with my hand movements, but music carries me away and I may at some spots (and please forgive me if I do) make a wrong movement at a certain time, but you know the score and could play on. So then do not look at me, at what I am doing, but listen to each other, listen to what happens around you."

Gorecki in Context among Polish American books at PAHA's 75th Annual Meeting.

paperback, 420 pages, $40.00, published in December 2017.

 ISBN 978-1-945938-10-8

The paperback, due to its large size, is divided into four e-books in E-Pub format: 

ISBN 978-1-945938-11-5 Book I: Ch.1-7; 

ISBN 978-1-945938-19-1 Book  II: Ch.8-10;

ISBN978-1-945938-20-7 Book  III: Ch.11-13; 

ISBN 978-1-945938-21-4 Book  IV:Ch.14-end

More information about the book is available on this blog, with the table of contents: 

http://moonrisepress.blogspot.com/2017/08/announcing-publication-of-gorecki-in.html

and on Moonrise Press websites: 

http://www.moonrisepress.com/gorecki.html

http://www.moonrisepress.com/gorecki-in-context-by-maja-trochimczyk.html

A preview about this book appeared in Post Eagle: 

https://www.posteaglenewspaper.com/gorecki-in-context-essays-on-music/

Announcing "Gorecki in Context: Essays on Music" Edited by Maja Trochimczyk

ISBN  978-1-945938-10-8 (paperback)

The paperback, due to its large size, is divided into four e-books in E-Pub format: 

ISBN 978-1-945938-11-5 Book I: Ch.1-7; 

ISBN 978-1-945938-19-1 Book  II: Ch.8-10;

ISBN978-1-945938-20-7 Book  III: Ch.11-13; 

ISBN 978-1-945938-21-4 Book  IV: Ch.14-end

The volume of interviews and studies of the music by Henryk Mikolaj Gorecki (1933-2010) is finally  seeing the light of day. The project was initiated in 2011, after the composer's death, as a tribute to him, and a way to present a more diverse image of the composer and his work as seen by Polish scholars, whose research is not well known in the English-speaking world.

The collection of interviews grew to seven texts, from 1962 to 2008, the studies include translations of Polish research and three essays of the editor, Maja Trochimczyk - an overview of his life and music, a study of his concept of "motherhood" and a description of his visit to Los Angeles in 1997. All these aspects were previously either unknown, not available in English, or neglected in Gorecki scholarship. So far, so good. We are waiting for the music publishers to respond with the copyright permissions, at which time the page numbers will be finalized and the book published.

Gorecki "sekunduje" (plays the second fiddle) in goralska kapela for the 50th anniversary

of the Tatra Eagle in New Jersey, September 1997. L to R: Prof. Thaddeus Gromada, Andrzej Bachleda, 

H. M. Gorecki, Jane Kedron. Used by Permission of Thaddeus Gromada

Below, you will find a reprint of the preface by the editor, and the table of contents listing the articles that "made the cut" and will highlight the diverse aspects of Gorecki's music in its Polish context.
Here are more links and pictures: http://chopinwithcherries.blogspot.com/2017/08/summer-with-poetry-and-art.html.  Trochimczyk's poem in his memory was published on the same Chopin with Cherries blog, in 2010: http://chopinwithcherries.blogspot.com/2010/11/gorecki-chopin-and-mountains.html. Excerpts with his interview about Chopin are also posted there.

⦾ GÓRECKI IN CONTEXT: ESSAYS ON MUSIC ⦾  

⦾ PREFACE ⦾

This volume gathers interviews and studies of the music of the Polish composer,  Henryk Mikołaj Górecki (1933-2010). Contributors include the composer himself – in a series of interviews spanning his entire career, from 1962 to 2008 – as well as leading Górecki scholars from Poland, the U.K., the U.S., and Australia. The collection includes a list of works, music examples, portraits, photographs, and a bibliography. The value of gathering five interviews in one place cannot be overestimated, as these encounters portray the mind of the composer and capture the changing interests that preoccupied him at various stages in his career.

The project brings together different views at the composer’s oeuvre, highlighting three of the four symphonies, each honored by a separate chapter: the Second Symphony Copernican (Kinga Kiwała), the Third Symphony  The Symphony of Sorrowful Songs (Maja Trochimczyk) and the Fourth Symphony Tansman Episodes (Andrzej Wendland). Two studies were contributed by an eminent Polish scholar and Górecki’s long-time personal friend, Prof. Teresa Malecka of Kraków, including an extensive review of the composer’s links to Polish musical traditions, and an overview of his piano music.  The studies are rounded up by an introductory overview of Górecki’s life and career and a case study of his visit to Los Angeles in 1997, when he conducted his Third Symphony for the first time outside of Poland, and made a huge impact on the musical life of California.

As one of the organizers of the 1997 Górecki Autumn Residency at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, and the composer’s personal translator and guide, I had an unusually close contact with the reclusive composer and was able to present his views in two interviews and several articles, with a focus on the Third Symphony.

I hope that this volume will serve to stimulate further research into the life and music of Henryk Mikołaj Górecki whose oeuvre goes well beyond the world-famous maverick of a piece, his Third Symphony, beloved and misinterpreted in equal measure.

Maja Trochimczyk

Jane Kedron, Andrzej Bachleda and Henryk Mikolaj Gorecki, October 1997, Los Angeles

⦾   ⦾   ⦾

⦾ CONTENTS ⦾

⦾ Maja Trochimczyk – Introduction

⦾ Luke B. Howard – Why Love Górecki?

⦾ Maja Trochimczyk – Mountains of Grief (Poem)


⦾  ⦾  ⦾

⦾ PART I ⦾

GÓRECKI ON LIFE AND MUSIC

⦾ Chapter 1 ⦾ — Page 3
Conversation with Henryk Górecki: Leon Markiewicz, July 1962  — Translated by Anna Maslowiec

⦾ Chapter 2 ⦾ — Page 12
“I Am Always Myself” – Says Henryk Mikołaj Górecki in Conversation with Mieczysław Kominek (December 1993)  —  translated by Maja Trochimczyk

⦾ Chapter 3 ⦾ — Page 22
 About Life and Music: A Conversation with Henryk Mikołaj Górecki (Zakopane, 16 July 1997) — Maja Trochimczyk

⦾ Chapter 4 ⦾ — Page 45
“Composing is a Terribly Personal Matter:” A Conversation with Henryk Mikołaj Górecki (April 1998) —Maja Trochimczyk

⦾ Chapter 5 ⦾ — Page 66
“There’s More to Life than the Arranging of Sounds” – Henryk Mikołaj Górecki in Conversation with Małgorzata and Marcin Gmys

 ⦾ Chapter 6 ⦾ — Page 80
“Music? A Visitor from Another World,” (15 October 2008), Henryk Mikołaj Górecki in Conversation with Małgorzata and Marcin Gmys

⦾ Chapter 7 ⦾ — Page 87
“Music is a Conversation.” Henryk Mikołaj Górecki Talks to Anna Wieczorek and Krzysztof Cyran (29 April 2008) —edited by Małgorzata Janicka-Słysz

⦾ PART II ⦾

ON GÓRECKI’S LIFE AND MUSIC

⦾ Chapter 8 ⦾ — Page 101
Górecki’s Life and Music: A Bird’s Eye View — Maja Trochimczyk

⦾ Chapter 9 ⦾
Henryk Mikołaj Górecki’s Symphony No. 2 Copernican:  Word and Sound and the Sublime — Kinga Kiwała  — Translated by Maja Trochimczyk

⦾ Chapter 10 ⦾
Mothers and Motherhood in Górecki's Third Symphony and Other Works  — Maja Trochimczyk

⦾ Chapter 11 ⦾
Górecki and the Polish Musical Tradition. Wacław of Szamotuły, Chopin, Szymanowski, Polish Folk and Church Music — Teresa Malecka
 
⦾ Chapter 12 ⦾
Górecki at the Keyboard: The Piano in his Compositional Output — Teresa Malecka

⦾ Chapter 13 ⦾
Górecki in Los Angeles, 1997 — Maja Trochimczyk

⦾ Chapter 14  ⦾
The  Phenomenon and Mystery of Górecki’s Fourth Symphony – Tansman. Epizody” —Andrzej Wendland (translated by Maja Trochimczyk)

⦾  ⦾  ⦾

⦾ Henryk Mikołaj Górecki - List of Works

⦾ Bibliography

⦾ Notes about Contributors

⦾ Index

⦾  ⦾  ⦾

Maja Trochimczyk with Gorecki in Context and other Moonrise Press books, 

at Modjeska Club Meeting, South Pasadena. Photo by Lucyna Przasnyski.

And here's the classic video with Gorecki listening to his Third Symphony with his favorite soprano, Zofia Kijanowicz as the soloist. From TVP Kultura.