A Conversation for Benjamin Britten's War Requiem

Why no mention of other Twentieth-Century requiems?

Post 1

paulh, vaccinated against the Omigod Variant

I heard Britten's "War Requiem" on the radio one time, and disliked it immensely. My comments are not about Britten's work, therefore, but about this comment in your article:

" Probably the best-known are the Requiems of Palestrina, Victoria, Mozart (written on his deathbed and unfinished), Cherubini, Gossec, Schumann, Dvorák, Bruckner, Verdi, Berlioz and Fauré."

I doubt that one person in 100 has even heard of Victoria, Gossec, and (even) Cherubini, let alone heard any of their music. (Although I have sung liturgical and secular music by Victoria, I didn't know he had even written any Requiems.) Thus, to say that their Requiems are among the better-known examples of the genre implies that it isn't a very robust genre. Mozart, Verdi, and Faure (and possibly Berlioz) are the heavy-hitters in Requiem-land.

However, it may be that future surveys of the Requiem will include some Twentieth-Century contributions such as those by Durufle and John Rutter (though some of Rutter's work is in English, and borrowed from the "Book of Common Prayer").

I believe that Michael Haydn (one of Franz Joseph Haydn's younger brothers) also wrote a Requiem, which (according to some scholars) Mozart was familiar with, and was influenced by.


Key: Complain about this post

Why no mention of other Twentieth-Century requiems?

Write an Entry

"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a wholly remarkable book. It has been compiled and recompiled many times and under many different editorships. It contains contributions from countless numbers of travellers and researchers."

Write an entry
Read more