Good Friday, April 18, 2025 – 7:30 pm
Tickets $30
St. James Westminster Church, 115 Askin Street, London
Fauré’s Requiem – In his seven-section Requiem, the French composer Gabriel Fauré distilled some of the most beautiful melodies he ever composed. The creation was almost certainly a musical tribute to his father, who died in 1885, three years before work on the Requiem began. As with much of Western classical music, the Requiem owes its roots to Christian faith. Traditionally, at its heart, it is a prayerful lament for the dead. Fauré’s Requiem was altogether different, though, because here was a composer who, unlike many of his contemporaries, had no clear religious beliefs. By contrast, he was very much a doubter, described by his own son as ‘a sceptic’. In place of the sombre nature of many requiems that had gone before, Fauré’s is noted for its calm, serene and peaceful outlook. Anyone looking for morose themes is searching in the wrong place. Instead, here we find musical solace in a work that focuses not on the morbid, but on the supposedly restful and fear-free nature of death. Of all seven sections, the Pie Jesu, Agnus Dei and In Paradisum emerge as the most glorious, filled with rich, soulful melodies.
Duruflé’s Requiem – One of the twentieth century’s best-loved choral works, Duruflé’s Requiem—a magical synthesis of the old (plainsong) and the new (a harmonic language appropriate to its time and place)—continues to cast its potent spell over performers and listeners alike. The Duruflé Requiem arouses the senses: its essence is mystical. Mysticism usually implies the protagonist’s separation from society – some kind of “release of self” in a lonely journey seeking the divine. The achingly beautiful chants upon which the Duruflé is based are filled with the lonely cries of 6th- and 7th- century “mystics.” The melodies are archaic and intended to be harmonically bare. Woven within the new, modally harmonic landscape of the Requiem, Duruflé captures and creates a mysterious aura, befitting the mystery of death.
