Góreki: Symphony #3

Górecki Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs) and Three Olden Style Pieces), performed by the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Antoni Wit ★★★★★
I have several versions of Górecki’s third symphony, both of which are excellent. Naxos provides a beautiful rendition of Górecki’s 3rd, with excellent sound and balance in this recording. Górecki is not a well-known composer, without a large volume of works to his name. He passed away in the 1990s. While being very distinctly 20th-century pieces of music, they are also most accessible to even the most die-hard classicist. The symphony is a sad piece, with orchestra occasional accompanied by a solo soprano voice. The music is haunting, but not in the freakish sense, such as one would get with Ligeti.  Wit masterfully conducts the symphony with a great amount of emotion that touches the listener. As a bonus, Naxos also included the Three Olden Style Pieces, composed in a similar genre to the third symphony, though without a vocal part. This is a piece that I would highly recommend to any discriminating classical music lover.