Verdi - Requiem | Barbican Concert Hall - 27 September 2018

Guildhall Symphony Orchestra & Chorus
James Blair - Conductor
David Vinden - Chorus master

Gweneth-Ann Rand - Soprano
Susan Bickley - Mezzo-soprano
Gwyn Hughes Jones - Tenor
Derek Welton - Bass

It was the deaths of two great Italians that prompted the composition of Verdi’s Requiem, or Latin Mass for the dead. The first was that of Gioachino Rossini, in 1868. Verdi proposed that his operatic predecessor should be commemorated in a composite Requiem, written by several of Italy’s leading composers; he himself contributed the final Libera me. The work was ready in time for performance on the first anniversary of Rossini’s death; but it fell victim to Italian musical politics, and remained unheard for many years.
Then in 1873 came the death of the dramatist, poet and novelist Alessandro Manzoni, whom Verdi admired greatly. For the first anniversary of Manzoni’s death, Verdi rewrote his earlier fragment and expanded it into a complete Requiem – helped by the fact that the text of the Libera me includes references back to passages earlier in the Requiem Mass, so that he had ready-made musical ideas for some sections. The ‘Manzoni Requiem’ was first performed in Milan in May 1874, with great success, and soon became popular throughout Europe.
Verdi was first and foremost an operatic composer, and the notion that there is an operatic quality to the Requiem can be traced back even before its first performance. In a magazine article, the pianist and conductor Hans von Bülow described it as Verdi’s ‘latest opera, albeit in church vestments’. In most respects, this is nonsense. The Requiem has virtually no characterisation, and certainly no dialogue. The balance, proportions and continuity of the different numbers are very different from those of Verdi’s operas. And the chorus plays a much more important part in the Requiem than it does in any of the operas – principally because its members are not constrained by the need to memorise all their music.

At the same time, Verdi’s musical language in the Requiem is not very different from that of his operas – although there are two big set-piece choral fugues which have no operatic equivalent: the Sanctus (for double choir) and the fugue in the Libera me. Like the operas, the Requiem boasts strikingly dramatic turns of harmony, a wide variety of instrumental colours, a range of textures from unsupported vocal lines to full chorus and orchestra, and above all an abundance of expressive melody. And in any case, Verdi’s whole approach to his subject was essentially a dramatic one. He was himself an agnostic, with little respect for the Catholic church. But he was clearly thrilled by the dramatic possibilities of the Requiem text – above all by the Dies irae, that vast fresco of the day of judgement. And the final Libera me is not only a last prayer for the dead, but also an anguished personal plea for salvation.

Guildhall Symphony Orchestra

Violin 1
Greta Papa
Melissa Hutter
Isabella Fleming
Harriet Haynes
Sophie-Louise Phillips
Kanon Miyashita
Kristine Harutyunyan
Zoe Hodi
Marta Opas
Joanna Strembicka
Leegene Kwon
Ivelina Ivanova
Claudia Gallardo Uriarte
Gaspard Perrotte
Christoforos Karathanasis
Clement Lebourgeois
Violin 2
Ragnhild Kyvik Bauge
Emma Curtis
Fanny Fheodoroff
Robyn Bell
Olivia Danielewicz
Serguei Gonzalez Pavlova
Victoria Stokland
Malvina Karagianni
Marta Raczka
Anastasia Egorova
Zora Orfgen
Ignacio Canto Lázaro
Merily Leotoots
Tiago Costa
Evie Rogers
Paula Guerra

Viola
Michiel Wittink
Abigale Bowen
Nicholas Hughes
Weronika Wisniewska
Ruby Bowler
Aleksandra Lipke
Hiu Nam Chan
Marta Tarsa
Isobel Doncaster
Michaela Bartosova
Georgia Russell
Laura Del Pozo Julián
Lara Bowles

Cello
Julia Sompolinska
Alicja Kozak
Alexandra Fletcher
Nia Williams
Chenyan Peng
Alexia Bergman
Lucinda Clare Neil
Rita Moutinho
Carlos Vesperinas García
Aline Christ

Double bass
Nick Vegas
Lewis Reid
Seth Edmunds
Evangelos Saklaras
Cole Morrison
Max Salisbury
Vilhelm Karlsson
Antonio Díaz Fernández

Flute
Enlli Parri
Andrew Martin
Amy Naddermier

Oboe
Katherine Jones
Rose Livsey-Barnes

Clarinet
Sam Gillespie
Hannah Hever

Bassoon
Madeleine Millar
Daniel Plant
Rachel Hurst
Ruby Collins

Horn
Myrddin Rees Davies
Ruben Isidoro
Karen Starkman
Frank Walker
Jacob Parker

Trumpet
Catherine Pollit
David Muncey
Luke Davies
Alex Brain

Trombone
James Goodwin
Sam Dye

Bass trombone
Adam Crighton

Cimbasso
Anna Carter

Timpani
Aidan Marsden

Percussion
Luke Hinchliffe

Off-stage trumpet
Jack Jones
Harry Plant
Scott Kempster
Philippa Scourse