Zbigniew Preisner (; born 20 May 1955 as Zbigniew Antoni Kowalski) is a Polish

film score A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film. The score comprises a number of orchestral, instrumental, or choral pieces called cues, which are timed to begin and end at specific points during the film in order to ...

composer A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music. Etymology and Defi ...

, best known for his work with

film director A film director controls a film's artistic and dramatic aspects and visualizes the screenplay (or script) while guiding the film crew and actors in the fulfilment of that vision. The director has a key role in choosing the cast members, p ...

Krzysztof Kieślowski Krzysztof Kieślowski (; 27 June 1941 – 13 March 1996) was a Polish film director and screenwriter. He is known internationally for ''Dekalog'' (1989), ''The Double Life of Veronique'' (1991), and the ''Three Colours'' trilogy (1993 –1994) ...

. He is the recipient of the Gold

Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis A medal or medallion is a small portable artistic object, a thin disc, normally of metal, carrying a design, usually on both sides. They typically have a commemorative purpose of some kind, and many are presented as awards. They may be int ...

as well as the Knight's Cross of the

Order of Polonia Restituta The Order of Polonia Restituta ( pl, Order Odrodzenia Polski, en, Order of Restored Poland) is a Polish state decoration, state Order (decoration), order established 4 February 1921. It is conferred on both military and civilians as well as on al ...

. He is a member of the French Film Academy.

Life

Zbigniew Preisner was born in

Bielsko-Biała Bielsko-Biała (; cs, Bílsko-Bělá, german: Bielitz-Biala, szl, Bjylsko-Bjoło) is a city in southern Poland, with a population of approximately 168,319 as of December 2021, making it the 22nd largest city in Poland, and an area of . It is a ...

, southern Poland, and studied history and philosophy at the

Jagiellonian University The Jagiellonian University (Polish: ''Uniwersytet Jagielloński'', UJ) is a public research university in Kraków, Poland. Founded in 1364 by King Casimir III the Great, it is the oldest university in Poland and the 13th oldest university in ...

Kraków Kraków (), or Cracow, is the second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city dates back to the seventh century. Kraków was the official capital of Poland until 1596 ...

. Never having received formal music lessons, he taught himself music by listening and transcribing parts from records. His compositional style represents a distinctively sparse form of tonal neo-Romanticism. Paganini and

Jean Sibelius Jean Sibelius ( ; ; born Johan Julius Christian Sibelius; 8 December 186520 September 1957) was a Finnish composer of the late Romantic and 20th-century classical music, early-modern periods. He is widely regarded as his country's greatest com ...

are acknowledged influences.

Career

Preisner is best known for the music composed for the films directed by fellow Pole Krzysztof Kieślowski. His ''Song for the Unification of Europe'', based on the Greek text of

1 Corinthians 13 1 Corinthians 13 is the thirteenth chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It is authored by Paul the Apostle and Sosthenes in Ephesus. This chapter covers the subject of Love. In the original ...

, is attributed to a character in Kieślowski's '' Three Colors: Blue'' and plays a dominating role in the story. His music for '' Three Colors: Red'' includes a setting of Polish and French versions of a poem by

Wisława Szymborska Maria Wisława Anna SzymborskaVioletta Szosta gazeta.pl, 9 February 2012. ostęp 2012-02-11 (; 2 July 1923 – 1 February 2012) was a Polish poet, essayist, translator, and recipient of the 1996 Nobel Prize in Literature. Born in Prowent ( ...

, a Polish

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; sv, Nobelpriset ; no, Nobelprisen ) are five separate prizes that, according to Alfred Nobel's will of 1895, are awarded to "those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind." Alfr ...

-winning poet. After working with Kieślowski on '' Three Colors: Blue'', Preisner was hired by the producer

Francis Ford Coppola Francis Ford Coppola (; ; born April 7, 1939) is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. He is considered one of the major figures of the New Hollywood filmmaking movement of the 1960s and 1970s. Coppola is the recipient of five A ...

to write the score for ''

The Secret Garden ''The Secret Garden'' is a novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett first published in book form in 1911, after serialisation in '' The American Magazine'' (November 1910 – August 1911). Set in England, it is one of Burnett's most popular novels an ...

'', directed by Polish director

Agnieszka Holland Agnieszka Holland (born 28 November 1948) is a Poles, Polish film and television director and screenwriter, best known for her political contributions to Polish cinema. She began her career as assistant to directors Krzysztof Zanussi and Andrzej ...

. Although Preisner is most closely associated with Kieślowski, he has collaborated with several other directors, winning a César in 1996 for his work on Jean Becker's '' Élisa''. He has won a number of other awards, including another César in 1994 for '' Three Colors: Red'', and the

Silver Bear The Berlin International Film Festival (german: Internationale Filmfestspiele Berlin), usually called the Berlinale (), is a major international film festival held annually in Berlin, Germany. Founded in 1951 and originally run in June, the festi ...

from the 47th Berlin International Film Festival 1997 for '' The Island on Bird Street''. He was nominated for

Golden Globe The Golden Globe Awards are accolades bestowed by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association beginning in January 1944, recognizing excellence in both American and international film and television. Beginning in 2022, there are 105 members of t ...

awards for his scores for '' Three Colors: Blue'' (1993) and

At Play in the Fields of the Lord ''At Play in the Fields of the Lord'' is a 1991 epic adventure drama film directed by Héctor Babenco, adapted from the 1965 novel of the same name by American author Peter Matthiessen. The screenplay was written by Babenco and Jean-Claude Carr ...

(1991). In 1998, '' Requiem for My Friend'', Preisner's first large scale work not written for film, premiered. It was originally intended as a narrative work to be written by

Krzysztof Piesiewicz Krzysztof Marek Piesiewicz (; born 25 October 1945 in Warsaw, Poland) is a Polish lawyer, screenwriter, and politician. From 1991 to 1993 and from 1997 to 2011 he was a member of Polish Senate. He was the head of the Ruch Społeczny (RS) or S ...

and directed by Kieślowski, but it became a memorial to Kieślowski after the director's death. The ''Lacrimosa'' from this Requiem appears in

Terrence Malick Terrence Frederick Malick (born November 30, 1943) is an American filmmaker. His films include '' Days of Heaven'' (1978), '' The Thin Red Line'' (1998), for which he received Academy Award nominations for Best Director and Best Adapted Screenp ...

's ''

The Tree of Life ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

''. The ''Dies Irae'' from this Requiem appears in the film ''

La Grande Bellezza ''The Great Beauty'' ( it, La grande bellezza ) is a 2013 art drama film co-written and directed by Paolo Sorrentino. Filming took place in Rome starting on 9 August 2012. It premiered at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival where it was screened in com ...

'', directed by

Paolo Sorrentino Paolo Sorrentino (; born 31 May 1970) is an Italian film director, screenwriter, and writer. His 2013 film ''The Great Beauty'' won the Academy Awards, Academy Award, the Golden Globe Awards, Golden Globe, and the British Academy of Film and Te ...

and in the second season of the television series ''

The Crown The Crown is the state in all its aspects within the jurisprudence of the Commonwealth realms and their subdivisions (such as the Crown Dependencies, overseas territories, provinces, or states). Legally ill-defined, the term has different ...

''. Preisner composed the theme music for the ''

People's Century ''People's Century'' is a television documentary series examining the 20th century. It was a joint production of the BBC in the United Kingdom and PBS member station WGBH Boston in the United States. The series was first shown on BBC in the 1995 ...

'', a monumental 26-part documentary made jointly in 1994 by the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

...

Life

Career

Van den Budenmayer

Works

Orchestral works

Music for solo instruments

Theatre

Film scores

References

External links