John Rutter on the 'Requiem'. 2: Liturgical settings

The second in a series of short films in which John Rutter discusses the composition of his 'Requiem' (1985). Here, Rutter surveys the varying ways in which composers including Berlioz, Verdi, Fauré, Duruflé and Britten approached their settings of the liturgical text of the Requiem Mass, and explains his own desire to create a small-scale work focusing on consolation and the journey from darkness to light. Includes a brief reference to Rutter's participation as a boy treble in the original recording of Britten's 'War Requiem', under the baton of the composer.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• John Rutter
• Rutter
• Berlioz
• Verdi
• Fauré
• Duruflé
• Britten
• War Requiem
• Requiem
• choral
• composition
• choral singing
• choir
• Cambridge Singers
• death
• Rutter Requiem

[alger3041]

Very odd - this work really does speak to me in some way - but the Faure work, which I also love, does not come to mind.

First of all, I prefer to get my own message, form my own images, from the music as I hear it, and thus I completely distance myself from the text as covering an area far too specific for me. The religious aspect of it does not come to mind at all.

I hear a mixture of Andrew Lloyd-Webber and Ralph Vaughan Williams in this music, which is rather a curious combination.

[FaerienceChannel]

U did the hell of a requiem!

Its eternal like the ones of Mozart, Brahms, Verdi and Faure