Giovanni Battista Pergolesi's Stabat Mater , written in 1736 for the local community, quickly became the most published work of the eighteenth century and the most popular Stabat Mater of the last three centuries

"He was adored for the extraordinary beauty of the melody, communicativeness of the message, beautiful and subtle devotion to music affectus tristitiae. Pergolesi presented the stanzas of Stabat Mater in the form of a cantata - a cycle of duets and solo arias, in the two-part da chiesa type" - Piotr Maculewicz

In 2010, to celebrate the 300th anniversary of Pergolesi's birth, Paweł Łukaszewski composed Luctus Mariae (Mourning of Mary) - a work directly referring to the famous cantata of the Baroque master. The piece was written to a contemporary Latin poem with an analogous structure and a similar message, written by Prof. Jerzy Wojtczak-Szyszkowski. Łukaszewski, while maintaining similarities in terms of structure (13 parts, divided into arias and duets), cast and affective side, uses contemporary means of expression appropriate to his style, extended tonality and vocal texture that is demanding on the singers.

This recording is the phonographic premiere of the work. The album is released in a hardcover album edition.