DESCRIPTION:
http://www.bju.edu - In celebration of Giuseppe Verdi's 200th birthday, Dr. Warren Cook conducts the Bob Jones University Choirs and Symphony Orchestra in a performance of Verdi's Requiem. This performance features nearly 270 instrumentalists and choristers and four guest soloists: soprano Hope Koehler, mezzo-soprano LaToya Lain, tenor Issachah Savage and bass Patrick Blackwell.

5:23 - II. Sequence (Dies irae)
9:31 - IV. Sanctus

March 1, 2013, Bob Jones University's Rodeheaver Auditorium, Greenville, SC.

WARREN COOK, conductor
HOPE KOEHLER, soprano
LATOYA LAIN, mezzo-soprano
ISSACHAH SAVAGE, tenor
PATRICK BLACKWELL, bass

REQUIEM
Giuseppe Verdi, 1813-1901

Verdi composed his most significant sacred work after he had already composed his twenty-six operas. He was sixty-one years old. The death of his friend, Alessandro Manzoni, the leading literary figure in 19th-century Italy, served as the catalyst for its creation. At the age of sixteen Verdi had read Manzoni's most famous work, I Promessi Sposi, and had always highly revered its author. After a mutual friend introduced them just five years before Manzoni died, Verdi reportedly said that he almost felt as if he should do obeisance to this great man. Verdi had considered the idea of setting the Requiem texts for some time. In fact, he had previously written one of the mass sections for a proposed Requiem to honor another of his heroes, Gioacchino Rossini, a work which never came to fruition.

According to Verdi's wishes, the first performance of the Manzoni Requiem was held in the Church at San Marco, Milan, on the first anniversary of Manzoni's death, May 22, 1874. The next performance and most subsequent ones were held in public concert halls. This idea of a concert venue provided Verdi freedom for the work's structure without the limitations of a liturgical service or an operatic stage. The seven sections of Verdi's Requiem move in uninterrupted sequence, providing the opportunity for drama of the highest rank, expressively and effectively supported by its colorful orchestration. After completing the work, Verdi wrote: "I have done nothing but write note after note, to the greater glory of God . . . now the music is done, and I am happy to have written it."

-Karen Wilson


Conductor's Perspective

Verdi's masterpiece is arguably the most powerful setting of this liturgical text. "The Fear of the Lord" would be an apt subtitle for this portrayal of man on the Great Judgment Day. Pleas for mercy are four times interrupted by the shattering hammer of the "Dies irae, dies illa." After the first terrifying scene, the judgment trumpet calls all to appear before the "King of dreadful majesty." The astounding force of full brass choir, orchestra and chorus provokes inescapable thoughts of one's mortality, which are given voice in solo and choral expressions of helpless vulnerability. Verdi, skeptical of the church, allows only the occasional glimmer of hope to arise, focusing more on the searching and questioning of the living than on the state of the dead. Each person hears this piece differently. Some find refuge in the "Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world." Others may "tremble and fear the judgment and wrath to come." It is important, however, to remember that this composition is and always has been a concert drama, not service music. Verdi altered the presentation of the traditional texts to suit his dramatic purposes and to revel in the glories of Italian culture. His success is obvious as the quietness, overwhelming force and incredible beauty of the music astonishes the senses and fires the imagination.

-Warren Cook