Requiem

“Go big or go home” might have been Berlioz’ motto when composing the Requiem (or Grande Messe des Morts), a 90-minute piece requiring a chorus of several hundred and a huge orchestra including four brass bands. Initially commissioned to commemorate the soldiers who died in the 1830 Revolution, it was eventually performed in December 1837 in memory of a French military commander. Berlioz had for some years harboured the idea of writing a Requiem setting, and was so flooded with ideas for the new work that he reportedly developed a style of musical shorthand to get them down on paper. His music is immensely wide-ranging in scale, from the merest whisper of violins and violas with which it begins to the primal roar of brass and 16 timpani signalling the “Tuba Mirum” section. The ethereal tenor solo in the “Sanctus” is another breath-catching moment, and in the concluding “Agnus Dei” the timpani return to sound a solemn valediction for the soul departed in death. Profoundly emotional and in places searingly dramatic, the Requiem cemented Berlioz’ reputation as the most original French composer of his generation, and of all his compositions it was the one he valued most.