Kadisz

Krzysztof Penderecki wrote this work to commemorate the liquidation of the Jewish ghetto in Łódź which took place 65 years ago. The composer utilises a text by the then fifteen-year-old ghetto inhabitant Abraham Cytryn for the introductory movement and has selected a variety of different texts for the remaining movements. In the second movement, a speaker recites the Lamentations of Jeremiah, and the third movement is a setting of the song of the three youths in the fiery furnace from the book of Daniel in an arrangement for a cappella male voice choir. The work is brought to a close with the Kaddisch jatom (’Orphan’s Kaddish’), an extended, tranquil recitative of profound intensity. Against a background of quiescent held notes by the strings and occasional interjections by the male voice choir representing the congregation, the tenor recites the traditional prayer with intense conviction.