The Story of the Exodus
In 1981 Polish composer Wojciech Kilar wrote a classical work for orchestra and chorus called "Exodus" in one movement, running about 23 minutes. It has a Bolero structure repeating the same motive again and again, starts very silent and builds up to a monumental finale adding the chorus.
Somewhere in the 80ies a friend presented me a LP he found on a flea market, which had two compositions by Kilar, one being the "Exodus". From there on he was one of my favorite composers.
Kilar also wrote lots of film scores, most of them in Poland and European countries and was not established in the international scene like his colleagues Morricone, Sarde or Delerue. Actually, no Eastern European composer was.
The first thing that brought "Exodus" to a certain fame was that director Christoph Zanussi, for whom Kilar wrote lots of film scores, directed a new movie in 1992 called "The Silent Touch" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104129/) that has a composer as main character. This composer gets the commission of writing a new work, and guess what this is at the end of the movie: Kilar's "Exodus" ! The composer was played by "Exorcist" Max von Sydow, and he even conducted the work at the end.
A year later Steven Spielberg heard the "Exodus" somewhere and was so fond of it that he used it as trailer music for "Schindler's List".
Next Francis Ford Coppola somehow discovered Kilar (I'm not certain on how this happened, but it might be through the "Schindler"-trailer), met him in Paris and -voila- engaged him for his "Dracula". From there on, Kilar was known in America, too, and scored the American productions "Death and the Maiden", "The Portrait of a Lady" and "The Ninth Gate". He also wrote a very short score for "The Pianist", and there is only one brief track on the CD, but this (as always with Kilar) is great.
The most important thing to say about him is that he is a real composer, not a "film music" composer. Most of his film music can be listed well without the movie for which it was written, it has (like a lot of John Williams' works) a structure that would fit in the concert hall as well.
By now he has film 162 entries in the movie database (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0004384/) and is still working with 74 ! I remember him saying once that he composes "very slow", but I think his definition of "slow" does not match with mine.
Every comment by other Kilar fans would be highly appreciated !
And now your patience is honored - here's the "Exodus", certainly one on the finest works Kilar ever composed:
http://rapidshare.com/files/346860/Kilar_Wojciech___1981___Exodus____Antoni_Wit_Conducting____22_57.mp3
Somewhere in the 80ies a friend presented me a LP he found on a flea market, which had two compositions by Kilar, one being the "Exodus". From there on he was one of my favorite composers.
Kilar also wrote lots of film scores, most of them in Poland and European countries and was not established in the international scene like his colleagues Morricone, Sarde or Delerue. Actually, no Eastern European composer was.
The first thing that brought "Exodus" to a certain fame was that director Christoph Zanussi, for whom Kilar wrote lots of film scores, directed a new movie in 1992 called "The Silent Touch" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0104129/) that has a composer as main character. This composer gets the commission of writing a new work, and guess what this is at the end of the movie: Kilar's "Exodus" ! The composer was played by "Exorcist" Max von Sydow, and he even conducted the work at the end.
A year later Steven Spielberg heard the "Exodus" somewhere and was so fond of it that he used it as trailer music for "Schindler's List".
Next Francis Ford Coppola somehow discovered Kilar (I'm not certain on how this happened, but it might be through the "Schindler"-trailer), met him in Paris and -voila- engaged him for his "Dracula". From there on, Kilar was known in America, too, and scored the American productions "Death and the Maiden", "The Portrait of a Lady" and "The Ninth Gate". He also wrote a very short score for "The Pianist", and there is only one brief track on the CD, but this (as always with Kilar) is great.
The most important thing to say about him is that he is a real composer, not a "film music" composer. Most of his film music can be listed well without the movie for which it was written, it has (like a lot of John Williams' works) a structure that would fit in the concert hall as well.
By now he has film 162 entries in the movie database (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0004384/) and is still working with 74 ! I remember him saying once that he composes "very slow", but I think his definition of "slow" does not match with mine.
Every comment by other Kilar fans would be highly appreciated !
And now your patience is honored - here's the "Exodus", certainly one on the finest works Kilar ever composed:
http://rapidshare.com/files/346860/Kilar_Wojciech___1981___Exodus____Antoni_Wit_Conducting____22_57.mp3
posted by Omega at 3:45 AM
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