Suita Warszawska
Witold Lutoslawski
" The suite he composed consists of three musical themes for each chapter "Written by Joep de Bruijn - Review of the music as heard in the movie
Suita Warszawska (Warsaw Suite, 1946) is a short Polish documentary directed by Tadeusz Makarczyński. It is presented as a musical and visual suite consisting of three episodes, showing the impact on the destroyed city of Warsaw after the Second World War.
The original score was composed by Witold Lutosławski, one of the few short documentaries he scored before his transitioning period in 1947, leading to inspiring sonorism compositions and a vast number of outstanding contemporary classical works later in his career. In the post-war period, he felt restricted as a composerwriting classical music, yet the same applies to all the documentaries he scored. However, Suita Warszawska is his most personal effort, despite sounding similar to an approach of the time and featuring limited musical significance.
The suite he composed consists of three musical themes for each chapter:
Klęska [Disaster] Adagio
Powrót do życia [Return to Life] - Andante
Wiosna Warszawski [Warsa Spring] - Allegro
The approach to this score is expressively orchestral but, as said, rooted in the veins of film scoring of the time; a lot of factual richness in musical display, but overall far removed from providing emotional attachment. In the first part of the film, Klęska, the light and shadow and portions of blurred imagery in its cinematography and limited, short-lived 'above functional' poetic music supporting the dramatic images of the ruins of Warsaw, are quite interesting, but otherwise it is nothing more than a historical document. Later on, Lutosławski does employ standardised musical ideas such as mimicking the movement of people and horses.
Whereas several other Polish composers were writing limited music for film, among them Krzysztof Penderecki, at least wrote functional music for a very good film, while Lutosławski wrote decent but very unapparent music for this and other archival documentaries.
(27-09-2025)
The original score was composed by Witold Lutosławski, one of the few short documentaries he scored before his transitioning period in 1947, leading to inspiring sonorism compositions and a vast number of outstanding contemporary classical works later in his career. In the post-war period, he felt restricted as a composerwriting classical music, yet the same applies to all the documentaries he scored. However, Suita Warszawska is his most personal effort, despite sounding similar to an approach of the time and featuring limited musical significance.
The suite he composed consists of three musical themes for each chapter:
Klęska [Disaster] Adagio
Powrót do życia [Return to Life] - Andante
Wiosna Warszawski [Warsa Spring] - Allegro
The approach to this score is expressively orchestral but, as said, rooted in the veins of film scoring of the time; a lot of factual richness in musical display, but overall far removed from providing emotional attachment. In the first part of the film, Klęska, the light and shadow and portions of blurred imagery in its cinematography and limited, short-lived 'above functional' poetic music supporting the dramatic images of the ruins of Warsaw, are quite interesting, but otherwise it is nothing more than a historical document. Later on, Lutosławski does employ standardised musical ideas such as mimicking the movement of people and horses.
Whereas several other Polish composers were writing limited music for film, among them Krzysztof Penderecki, at least wrote functional music for a very good film, while Lutosławski wrote decent but very unapparent music for this and other archival documentaries.
(27-09-2025)