Archived event
Performance details
Friday 14 April 2023 at 7.30pm
Saturday 15 April 2023 at 7.30pm
Arts Centre Melbourne, Hamer Hall
Featuring
Melbourne Symphony Orchestra
Jaime Martín conductor
Samantha Clarke soprano
Toby Spence tenor
David Greco baritone
Gondwana Voices
Lyn Williams AM children's chorus director
MSO Chorus
Warren Trevelyan-Jones chorus director
Program
Britten War Requiem
About this performance
The MSO is joined by the MSO Chorus, Gondwana Voices and a stellar line up of soloists for Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem – a moving musical masterpiece that commemorates the victims of war without ever glorifying war.
Britten’s War Requiem was composed for the 1962 opening of a newly-built cathedral in Coventry, England – situated next to the ruins of its predecessor, destroyed during the Second World War.
With his unique harmonic voice, Britten combines the traditional Latin Requiem Mass with the poetry of Wilfred Owen, a World War I soldier who died on the fields of France in 1918, to create a haunting and moving tribute to the fallen.
Featuring a large symphony orchestra plus a a small chamber orchestra, choirs of adults and children, and three solo vocalists, this awe-inspiring and dramatic piece evokes the pain and suffering of the victims of war but ends with a moving dream of a peaceful world as all voices and instruments come together at last.
Prepare for one of the biggest, boldest MSO performances of the year!
Duration: approx. 90 minutes, no interval
