Verdi's 'Requiem' performed
for the Pope and Synod fathers
Adapted from
Oct. 18, 2010
Giuseppe Verdi's
Messa da Requiemwas performed at the Aula Paolo VI this evening for the Holy Father and the participants of the current special Synodal assembly for the Middle East by the Chorgemeinschaft Neubeuern choir, Die Klang Verwaultung orchestra and four German soloists under musical director Enoch zu Guttenberg.
One of the world's most popular Requiem Masses, it was composed by the great Italian composer in 1874 for the city of Milan on the occasion of the first death anniversary of Italy's greatest 19th-century novelist Alessandro Manzoni.
Its success was enormous and the composition’s fame went well beyond the country’s borders. In 1875 Verdi made a revision by substituting a choral movement with an aria for mezzo-soprano.
Tonight's soloists were soprano Susanne Bernhard, mezzo-soprano Gerhild Romberger, tenor Eto Rosin and bass Yorck Felix Speer.
Here is a translation of the Holy Father's remarks after the concert.
Your Eminences,
Venerated Brothers,
Distinguished ladies adn gentlemen:
At the end of such an intense listening experience, the spirit would like to pause in meditation, but at the same time, one feels the need to demonstrate appreciation.
He contiuned in German:
I express heartfelt thanks to Maestro Enoch zu Guttenberg for his friendly words and for offering this concert as a gift from him ahd the wonderful orchestra Die Klangverwaltung, with the Choral Society of Neubeuer and the family of the Barons von and zu Guttenberg.
To you, the musical director of this performance, and to the soloists and every single member of the orchestra and choir, goes my appreciation. Thank you very much!
He resumed in Italian:
I am happy to greet the cardinals and prelates, especially the Synodal fathers, the distinguished authorities, and all of you - including the wards of Rome's diocesan Caritas - who were able to enjoy this excellent execution of Giuseppe Verdi's Messa da Requiem.
He composed it in 1873 on the death of Alessandro Manzoni whom he admired and almost venerated. In a letter he wrote: "What can I tell you of Manzoni? How to explain the most tender, indefinable, and new sensations evoked in me by the presence of that saint, as you call him?"
In the mind of the great composer, this work would have been the culmination and final work of his musical production. Not only was it his tribute to the great writer, but it was also a response to an artistic exigency - interior and spiritual - produced in him by the confrontation with the human and Christian stature of Manzoni.
Giouseppe Verdi spent his life scrutinizing the heart of man, In his operas, he brought to light the drama of the human condition, through music, the stories depcited, and their various characters. His theater is populated by the unhappy, the persecuted, victims.
Many pages of the Requiem re-echo this tragic vision of human destiny: In it, we touch the ineluctable reality of death and the fundamental questions about the transcendent world.
Verdi, not constrained by theatrical requirements, and using only the words of the Catholic liturgy and his music, presents the spectrum of human sentiments when facing the end of life: man's anguish confronting his own fragile nature, the sense of rebellion against death, the dismay one feels on the threshold of eternity.
This music invites us to reflect on the final realities, with all the possible states of the human heart, in a series of contrasts of forms, tones, colors, in alternating dramatic and melodic passages, marked by hope.
Giuseppe Verdi, who, in a famous letter to his publishers at Ricordi, called himself 'a bit atheist', wrote this Mas swhich seems to be a great appeal to the Eternal Father, in its attempt to overcome the cry of desperation in the face of death, in order to recover the yearning for life that becomes a silent and heartfelt prayer: "Libera me, Domine".
The Verdi Requiem, in fact, opens with a phrase in A minor, which almost seems to descend into silence - just a few chords from the cellos, pianissimo, muted - and conlcudes with the submissive invocation to the Lord, "Libera me".
This musioal cathedral discloses itself as a description of man's spiritual drama in the face of Almighty God, of man who cannot escape the eternal questions about his own existence.
After the Requiem, Verdi underwent a sort of 'second season' of musical composition which would close once again with religious music, the Pezzi Sacri [Four Sacred Pieces]. It is a sign of his spiritual disquiet, a sign that the yearning for God is written in man's heart because our hope rests in the Lord.
"Qui Mariam absolvisti, et latronem exaudisti, mihi quoque spem dedisti", we heard. "You who pardoned Mary (Magdalene) and granted the good thief's dying wish, you have given hope even to me".
The great musical fresco we heard this evening renews in us the certainty of St. Augustine's words: "Inquietum est cor nostrum, donec requiescat in te" - Our heart is uneasy until it rests in you. (Confessions, I,1).
He resumed speaking German:
Dear friends, we must thank the Lord yet again that he has given us this moment of true Beauty to uplift our spirits. At the same time, we must thank all those who have been the instruments of God's Providence.
Most heartfelt thanks to you, Herr Professor zu Guttenberg. Many thanks to you, teh soloists, and to all the members of the orchestra and choir, and everyone who in various ways have contributed to the success of this beautiful evening. A heartfelt Vergelt's Gott to all of you.
Thank you and good evening.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 18/10/2010 22:15]