The Polish composer Henryk Gorecki (born 1933) achieved world-wide renown in 1992 when his Third Symphony, written in 1976, was recorded on CD and became an international bestseller. It is now one of the best known musical compositions of recent years, yet Gorecki's other music is stillrelatively little known. This study, by a leading enthusiast of Gorecki's music, is the first detailed account of his works in any language, and provides biographical information as background to the music.Adrian Thomas discusses Gorecki's position as leader of the Polish avant-garde in the late 1950s, and his subsequent discovery of the folk and church music of Old Poland, notably that of the Podhale region in southern Poland. He describes Gorecki's unmistakable musical world, from the largeorchestral scores (Sconti, Refrain, the Symphonies) and the choral works (Beatus Vir, commissioned by and dedicated to Pope John Paul II), to the more modest church songs and folk-song arrangements. There is a complete list of works since 1955 with details of instrumentation and recordings, and aselect bibliography.