The Christian Century reports:
When radio stations started playing Henryk Górecki's Symphony No. 3 known as the Symphony of Sorrowful Songs, it was reported that drivers would pull off the road because the haunting, mournful music left them in tears. A 14-year-old Swedish burn victim wrote to Górecki to say that the Third Symphony was what kept her alive. The 1992 Elektra Nonesuch recording of the work, with American soprano Dawn Upshaw singing the soprano part, sold over a million copies and climbed to the top of the classical charts in both the U.S. and the U.K.
The composer, who died November 12 at the age of 76, was not known well outside his native Poland until his success with the Third Symphony. Written for orchestra and soprano solo, the work is a memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. The theme is the separation of a mother from her child. It draws on the words a girl had written on a prison wall in southern Poland: "Oh Mamma do not cry—Immaculate Queen of Heaven support me always."
No piece of music has ever emotionally touched me as deeply as Henryk Górecki's Symphony No. 3. The word is richer because of his music and faith.
