Penderecki: Magnificat, Kadisz / Wit
) | Label: NAXOS Catalog: 8572697 Format: CD Warsaw Philharmonic Choir and Orchstra; Antoni Wit; Wojciech Gierlach; Olga Pasichnyk; Alberto Mizrahi; Daniel OlbrychskiThe two works on this recording are separated by 35 years, during which time the revered Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki (b. 1933) made a decisive break with the post-war European avant-garde. In the Magnificat, chilling instrumental clusters, spectral sounds and impassioned rhetoric unite with tonality and counterpoint to deliver a work of monumental emotional power. Written to mark the 65th anniversary of the end of the Jewish ghetto in Łódź, Kadisz is among the most distinctive of Penderecki’s later choral works in the stark contrasts between drama and somber reflection of its individual sections. Antoni Wit (b. 1944), one of the most highly regarded Polish conductors and a champion of Polish music whose discography has now surpassed 150 albums, leads the Warsaw Philharmonic, distinguished vocal and speaker soloists and an array of vocal ensembles and choirs.  Price: $19.98 |