Grzegorz Gerwazy Gorczycki

Gorczycki studied theology at the University of Vienna and the University of Prague, one of which awarded him a doctorate. By 1698 he was the director of the chapel of Wawel Cathedral which was a position he maintained until he died. He was the principal representative of Polish music during the Baroque period. The primary genre of his production was the liturgical mass although he also composed an overture and a polannaise for instrumental music. Gorczycki demonstrated a number of characteristics in his music which included conventional polyphony for voice, concert methods, dialogues between instruments, and solo instruments contrasted with all instruments playing together. ~ Keith Johnson