Krzysztof Penderecki's photo

Krzysztof Penderecki

Born: 1933-11-23 in Dębica, Podkarpackie, Polska

Died: 2020-03-29

Known For: Sound

Biography

Krzysztof Eugeniusz Penderecki (23 November 1933 – 29 March 2020) was a Polish composer and conductor. His best-known works include Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima, Symphony No. 3, his St Luke Passion, Polish Requiem, Anaklasis and Utrenja. His oeuvre includes five operas, eight symphonies and other orchestral pieces, a variety of instrumental concertos, choral settings of mainly religious texts, as well as chamber and instrumental works. After graduating from the Academy of Music in Krakow, he became a teacher there and began his career as a composer in 1959 during the Warsaw Autumn festival. His Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima for string orchestra and the choral work St. Luke Passion have received popular acclaim. His first opera, The Devils of Loudun, was never successful despite repeated revisions. In the mid-1970s, Penderecki became a professor at the Yale School of Music. From the mid-1970s his composition style changed, with his first violin concerto focusing on the semitone and the tritone. His choral work Polish Requiem was written in the 1980s and expanded in 1993 and 2005. Penderecki won many prestigious awards, including the Prix Italia in 1967 and 1968; the Wihuri Sibelius Prize of 1983; four Grammy Awards in 1987, 1998 (twice), and 2017; the Wolf Prize in Arts in 1987; and the University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition in 1992. In 2012, Sean Michaels of The Guardian called him "arguably Poland's greatest living composer". In 2020 the composer's alma mater, the Academy of Music in Kraków, was renamed in his honour.

Filmography

2025

2021

  • Day ... (Music)

2016

2015

  • Demon ... (Original Music Composer)

2011

2009

2008

2007

1998

1991

1989

1987

1986

1984

1983

1980

1978

  • Threnos ... (Original Music Composer)

1974

1969

1968

1966

1965

1964

1963

1962

1961

1960

1959