Madison Symphony
Orchestra Program Notes
April 12-13-14, 2024
98th Season /
Subscription Program 7
J.
Michael Allsen
Verdi’s Requiem is one of
the
great sacred works of the 19th century, and one of the
most dramatic settings
of the Mass for the Dead.
Giuseppe Verdi
Born: October
10, 1813, Le
Roncole, Italy.
Died:
January 27, 1901, Milan, Italy.
Messa da Requiem
•
Composed:
In
1868 and 1873.
•
Premiere:
Verdi conducted the first
performance in Milan on May 22, 1874.
•
Previous
MSO Performances: 1936,
1937, 1945, 1954, 1965, 1978, 1991, 2002, and 2009.
•
Duration:
83:00.
Background
This huge work is
Verdi’s contribution to a centuries-old tradition of Requiem settings.
It had its roots in an
unsuccessful attempt to memorialize composer Gioacchino
Rossini. Verdi
eventually completed the Requiem in honor
of the poet Alessandro Manzoni.
The Latin text of the Requiem, or
Mass for the Dead, has
provided composers with inspiration for over 500 years.
The first polyphonic
settings of the text were composed in the 15th century,
and there is an
unbroken tradition of Requiems that
continues down to our own day: there are literally
thousands of settings of the
complete Mass for the Dead, or its individual movements.
In the Catholic
liturgy prior to the Vatican II reforms, the Latin Requiem was sung at burial services and on
All Soul’s Day (November
2), in remembrance of the faithful dead. The chant texts
that comprise this
Mass were complete by the 14th century, and they provide
a rich source of
imagery and emotion. At the heart of the Requiem
is the lengthy sequence Dies irae,
which was written by the 13th-century monastic poet
Thomas of Celano. This text
dwells on the terror and destruction of the Day of Judgment foretold in the Book of
Revelations, and the petitioner interjects forlorn
prayers for safety from the
Lord’s wrath. After the horror of the Dies
irae, the texts become more comforting in nature.
The offertory Domine
Jesu Chiste offers prayers for
the dead, and recalls the promise of redemption. The
gentle imagery of the Lux aeterna, a
further prayer for
intercession, celebrates the merciful Lord. The final
movement, Libera
me, speaks with the most personal
voice of all the Requiem
texts: the
petitioner prays directly to the Lord, expressing fear
and hope for
deliverance.
Verdi’s monumental setting of the Requiem began
in 1868, the year of
Gioacchino Rossini’s death. Verdi, who called Rossini as
“one of the glories of
Italy,” proposed a musical tribute by Rossini’s
colleagues: a Requiem
Mass, whose individual sections
would be composed by thirteen leading Italian composers.
Verdi reserved the
final section, the Libera me, for
himself, and assigned the remaining sections of the Mass
to the other twelve
composers according to an overall tonal and textural
plan. Nearly all of the
twelve were influential church musicians, though most
had written for the
stage, as well. (For the most part, they are forgotten
today.) The project was
completed early in 1869, when all of the individual
movements were gathered in
Milan, and submitted to Verdi’s publisher, Ricordi.
Verdi’s original proposal
was to have the Messa
per Rossini
performed in Bologna, on the first anniversary of
Rossini’s death. After this
first and only performance, the score would be sealed
and placed in the vault
of Bologna’s Music School as a monument to Rossini, who
had spent much of his
career in that city.
This grandiose plan fell victim to
a lack of available funds and to Italian musical
politics: the opera partisans
in Bologna would have nothing of a proposal that
originated in the rival city
of Milan! The projected concert was never arranged, and
Verdi was soon too busy
with the production of his opera Aïda
to make his own arrangements for a performance of this
musical patchwork. He
set aside the Messa
per Rossini,
although he showed his completed score for the Libera me to his colleague Alberto
Mazzucato. Mazzucato urged Verdi
to abandon the opening twelve sections, and complete the
Requiem himself, suggesting that, by
itself, the Libera
me contained enough musical
material to generate an entire Mass.
Alessandro Manzoni
The death of
Alessandro Manzoni in
1873 rekindled Verdi’s interest in the Requiem.
Manzoni was a beloved literary figure, and a leading
voice of the Catholic
spiritual revival that took place in 19th-century Italy.
On hearing of
Manzoni’s death, Verdi immediately wrote to the mayor of
Milan with an offer to
write a Requiem
for Manzoni, saying:
“It is a heartfelt impulse—or rather necessity—that
prompts me to honor as best
I can that Great One, whom I so much admired as a writer
and venerated as a
man.” As suggested by Mazzucato, Verdi had already
realized much of the music
for the Requiem
in his Libera me
setting of 1869. The Dies irae
section of the Libera
me was used to bind together the
many sections of the sequence, and much of the musical
material for the opening
Requiem aeternam
was ready-made in
the 1869 movement, as well. The remainder of the music
was completed by the end
of 1873. Verdi conducted the first performance of his Requiem at church of San Marco in Milan on
May 22, 1874, the first
anniversary of Manzoni’s death. The response to the
premiere was so enthusiastic
(at least three of the movements were encored) that the
Milanese demanded three
more performances, produced at the theater of La Scala.
Verdi took the work on
an international tour soon thereafter, and it was heard
throughout Italy, in
Paris, and in London.
There were a few critics who found
Verdi’s treatment of the Latin texts too “operatic” for
the solemn Mass, but he
composer’s wife Giuseppina answered them simply and
effectively: “Verdi must
write like Verdi—according to his way of feeling and
interpreting the text. The
religious spirit and the way in which it finds
expression must bear the imprint
of its time and the individuality of the author.” Just
what did the Requiem
mean to Verdi himself? The
genesis of the Requiem
was certainly
tied to what seems to have been genuine regard for
Rossini and Manzoni, and a
desire to memorialize them in a fitting way. However,
the work does not seem to
have been an expression of deep Catholic faith: Verdi
was notoriously private
about his inner life, but all indications point to the
probability that the Requiem’s
composer was an agnostic. (In
his classic biography of Verdi, Julian Budden points out
that two more openly
agnostic composers, Brahms and Vaughan Williams,
produced similarly profound
religious works.) Sacred composers in Italy at this
time—generally regarded as
second-raters who did not work in the more refined world
of opera—worked within
an established style that fit the conservative
liturgical purposes of the
Church. Verdi’s setting of this traditional text
transcends any traditional
boundaries.
Throughout his life, Verdi the
dramatist was attracted to strongly emotional
topics—selecting poems, novels,
and historical subjects that would transfer well to the
stage after they had
been adapted to the dramatic needs of a stage work and
made “singable” by a
librettist. In the Requiem Mass,
Verdi had a ready-made, dramatic, and eminently singable
text that covered to
entire range of human emotions, from terror, shame, and
sadness to hope and
exaltation. Verdi’s response to this text contains a
tremendous scope of
musical sentiment, ranging from the awful power of the Dies irae and the strict counterpoint of
the Sanctus, to the unabashedly emotional
outbursts of Recordare
and Ingemisco.
What You’ll Hear
Verdi clearly saw
the Requiem
texts with the eye of a great dramatist, and his settings
capture the Requiem’s
huge range of emotions. [Note
that this performance will be accompanied by a
projected translation.]
The Requiem opens quietly, with hushed
statements by the choir. Though
Verdi is not usually described as a writer of
counterpoint, the lush four-part
writing at Te
decet hymnus shows him
to be a master. At the Kyrie, Verdi
introduces the soloists, one by one. The end of the
movement builds towards the
first musical climax of the Requiem.
Verdi’s setting of the sequence
text Dies irae is
complex and
lengthy, spanning nearly half the duration of the Requiem. The movement opens with the first
statement of the words
“The day of wrath” together with full fortissimo
orchestra. Verdi may have been inspired, in part, by the
similarly massive and
theatrical setting of Dies irae by
Berlioz in his Requiem
Mass. Verdi’s Dies
irae returns throughout the second
section, as a reminder of the horrible Day of Judgment. The Tuba mirum
begins, appropriately, with trumpet calls echoing
between the orchestra and
four offstage trumpets, and the choir’s music continues
this fanfare-like
character. The stunning mezzo-soprano solo at Liber scriptus was written specifically
for Maria Waldmann, a fine
contralto, whose voice Verdi admired. This aria is
followed by a reprise of the
Dies irae. The
bleak prayer of the
vocal trio at Quid
sum miser is
followed by the distinctive dotted-note theme of Rex tremendae, and countermelodies in the
solo quartet. The Rex
tremendae ends with a passionate
setting of the words “Save me, O Fount of Pity.” The Recordare, Ingemisco, and
Confutatis are
more soloistic in
character: here Verdi gives his gift for melody free
reign. After a final
reprise of the Dies
irae, is the
closing scene of this religious drama’s first act. The
quartet and chorus
intone the passionate prayer of the Lacrymosa,
and the section closes with a hushed “Amen.”
The third movement, the Offertory,
is a showpiece for the quartet, containing moments of
what one writer has
called “undiluted opera.” The movement is held together
by two statements of
the music for quam
olim Abrahae—a
gentle reminder to the Lord of his promised redemption.
The Sanctus and Agnus Dei
texts are familiar parts of Ordinary of the Mass—those
movements that are sung
at every Catholic service—although the Agnus
Dei is changed slightly in the traditional Requiem to include a prayer for the dead.
In the Sanctus,
Verdi once again displays his
skill in countrapuntal writing: after an opening fanfare
and intonation, he
writess eight-part counterpoint for two opposed choirs.
The setting of Pleni
sunt coeli at the end provides
contrast with its more reserved style. The Agnus
Dei is a series of exchanges between the two
female singers and the chorus.
The choral writing here is beautiful in its simplicity,
and recalls many of
Verdi’s operatic choruses. The brief Lux
aeterna that follows contains quiet, almost
chantlike music for the three
lower voices of the vocal quartet.
Like the second movement, the Libera me is
lengthy and complex in
structure. Verdi made only slight revisions to the 1869
version of this
movement for the Manzoni Requiem. The
result is that much of the musical material he used for
earlier movements is
present here, as well. This makes it particularly
effective—it works like a
recapitulation of the most stirring themes and
sentiments. Verdi begins with a
quick recitation of the opening line of text and an
expanded treatment of the
imagery of catastrophe. After a final statement of the Dies irae, there is a passage of
breathtaking beauty: a soprano
melody on Requiem
aeternam that soars
to a high B-flat above unaccompanied chorus. For me,
this passage represents
the culmination of the entire Requiem—a
jewel of absolution and forgiveness set amidst the
destruction and fear of Judgment Day.
With the soprano’s
benediction still hanging in the air, the movement moves
towards its musical
climax: a massive choral fugue. The Requiem
does not end at this high level of volume and
excitement, however. Verdi brings
the Mass to a close with a quiet and intensely personal
appeal for deliverance.
Postscript:
For more
than a century, the Messa per Rossini
was known only as the first chapter in the story of
Verdi’s Requiem.
However, there is an epilogue
to this part of the story. In 1970, musicologist David
Rosen (who—I can’t
resist adding—was one of my teachers at UW-Madison!) was
in Milan, doing
research on Verdi, when he discovered a complete score
of the Messa per
Rossini, together with several
autograph scores of the individual movements. It had
long been supposed that
the Mass was lost, but it had it had been quietly
gathering dust in the Ricordi
vault for over a century. The Messa per
Rossini was finally given its world premiere in
1988—some 119 years late!
________