Penderecki: “Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima”

On this day, seventy-three years ago, the U.S. dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Three days later, on August 9, 1945, a second bomb destroyed the Japanese city of Nagasaki. Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima, written in 1960 by Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki (b. 1933), was not originally inspired by the devastation of the atomic bomb. The piece was first called 8’37”- a reference to its estimated duration, with a nod to John Cage. It …

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