Henryk Mikolaj Górecki

Henryk Górecki (born 1933 in Czernica, Poland) became world famous in 1993 because a recording of his Symphony No. 3, "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs" achieved popularity and opened the way for other Eastern European composers who composed similarly marketable music based on religious themes. Yet this work was written in 1976, marking the end of Górecki's earlier avant-garde phase and initiating a period of composition in tonal and modal idioms, often on Polish folk melodies. His stance against Polish communist authorities won him many admirers, and his motet Totus Tuus was composed in 1987 in tribute to Pope John Paul II. ~ Blair Sanderson, All Music Guide