Monday 29 January 2024 at 20:00 - Salle Garnier de l'Opéra de Monte-Carlo
Choral concert : Brahms - Ein deutsches Requiem
Conductor Gianluca Capuano
Choirmaster Stefano Visconti
- Music by Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)
- Premiere : Gewandhaus, Leipzig, 18 february 1869
One of the first actions taken by the new management of the Opéra de Monte-Carlo was to introduce a series of concerts designed to enhance the repertoire of the Opera’s choir and reveal to the public the full scope of its abilities. Following Rossini’s Stabat Mater earlier this year and Verdi’s Requiem at the beginning of this season, it is the turn of Johannes Brahms’ German Requiem to be presented in this new series. Between 1856 and 1868 the composer had been deeply affected by the death of two loved ones: Robert Schumann, his mentor, and the death of his own mother. His grief inspired him to create what was to become his passport to glory. Premiered in 1869, this sacred but non-liturgical work opened to him the world of symphonic music, a universe that, until then, he had hesitated to approach. Although Brahms failed with his intention to write an ecumenical work, its humanist character tran-spires through its inspired writing, vibrating with inward rather than ostentatious feeling. A German Requiem, half Baroque funeral cantata in its form and half Romantic oratorio in its scale, is the perfect choice to allow the Musiciens du Prince – Monaco, directed by Gianluca Capuano, to fully restore the sound of that period through their sensitive approach to the music of the 19th century.
