A Good Friday production of “Requiem,” by Gabriel Faure, will be presented at 7 p.m. at Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ, 232 West Onondaga St., Syracuse. James O. Welsch, director of music ministries at Liverpool First United Methodist Church and assistant professor of music at Setnor School of Music, will conduct a combined choir with organ and chamber orchestra.
Vocalists from four area churches have prepared the music with their choir directors. They are: Liverpool First United Methodist, Welsch; Plymouth Congregational, Joseph Downing; the First Unitarian Universalist Society, Jonathan English, and University United Methodist Church, Martha Sutter. Downing will play the organ; the baritone and soprano solos will be sung by professional vocalists.
Comprised of seven movements, the “Requiem” represents Faure’s own selection of text that emphasizes themes of rest and peace for all souls after death. It offers praise and seeks mercy, beseeching the Lord Jesus Christ to deliver the souls of the dead from punishment and to grant them rest. The words, which will be sung in Latin, are prayers for God’s eternal light to shine on all souls and for the angels to lead the way to paradise.
The combined choirs will sing the John Rutter 1984 edition, which attempts to honor the composer’s original intention to create a “petit Requiem.” The original score with four movements was composed in 1888, and Faure subsequently enlarged it by including additional movements. By1900, a performance at the Paris World Exhibition was done with full orchestration, a score that Rutter, in his preface, states was probably not the work of Faure.
Welsch said he suggested the choirs collaborate on this piece as a way for them to give a gift of deeply sacred music to the community during Lent.
“We have brought together several choirs that might not have the aspiration or resources to do a piece of this magnitude on their own. When joined with other choirs, however, they can prepare a work that is larger in scope and more demanding musically than their usual fare,” Welsch said. “I see this as a spiritual quest for each individual as well as an experience of collaborative outreach as we offer the music to the community.”
The presentation is free. For information, contact Welsch at 457-5180.
Mar
30
Combined Choirs to present Faure’s Requiem
03/30/09
CATEGORY: Religion and Spirituality