Mozart Requiem

Usher Hall 30/4/26

Scottish Chamber Orchestra

Riccardo Minasi conductor

Louise Alder soprano, Hanna Hipp mezzo soprano, Julien Henric tenor, Daniel Okulitch bass baritone

SCO Chorus

Gregory Batsleer chorus director

Tonight’s very well attended concert features two choral works, written within five years of each other in very different circumstances, Mozart’s 1791 Requiem, partially composed in the last weeks of the 35-year-old’s life, and completed by his pupil, Süssmayr, and Haydn’s Paukenmesse, written in 1796 as part of the 64 year-old’s ongoing contract with the Esterhazy family. David Kettle’s programme notes are an excellent guide to the background of both works.

Riccardo Minasi, Artistic Director of the Orchestra La Scintilla at Zurich Opera House, in his SCO debut, conducts a 47-strong orchestra, using natural brass and timpani throughout. Haydn’s Mass, whose subtitle 'Mass in Time of War', reflects the realities of Austrian life at the end of the eighteenth century with Napoleon Bonaparte victorious in the north of Italy, is, until the concluding Agnus Dei, largely cheerful, with the strings, winds and brass providing warm accompaniment to full-blown chorus and solo singing. Minasi drives the chorus on through the celebratory sections of the Gloria, but gives plenty of space to bass baritone, Daniel Okulitch’s slow ‘Qui tollis peccata mundi with cello accompaniment (guest principal Robin Michael). The Credo begins brightly, becoming solemn as we reach the narrative about Christ’s life on earth, the choir’s diminuendo almost reaching a whisper before bursting forth with the joyful news of the resurrection.

The soloists, at the front of the stage, are all in in good voice, their voices bright in the solo passages and well-blended in the ensembles, soprano, Louise Alder, often taking the lead in the passages where they sing as a quartet. In the Benedictus, her legato melody is sung against the lighter, almost staccato lines of the other three soloists – a pleasing touch.

War takes over in the Agnus Dei. Paukenmesse means timpani mass, and Louise Lewis Goodwin rolls the kettle drums ominously in the quiet opening section, ‘like war at a distance’ as one of Haydn’s contemporaries said. The brass and chorus join in more threateningly and despite the warmer feel of the Dona nobis pacem, some ambiguity remains. A compelling and nuanced account of a relatively unknown work.

While there are many choral settings of the Mass, Requiems are much rarer, although three of them, Mozart’s, Verdi’s and Britten’s might make most lists of top ten choral works. The text for the Requiem is the Mass for the Dead in which the Gloria and Credo are replaced by the Sequence which begins with the ‘Dies irae' and deals, in its many sections, with the day of judgement. Mozart was clearly inspired by the Old Testament text to write music which comprehends various emotions from the wrathful to the consolatory.

After the stately choral Requiem aeternum and the Kyrie, in which we hear the soloists for the first time, the Dies Irae is a showstopper, a devastating portrayal of the day of judgement (My own unforgettable introduction to the Requiem was a trial run of the Dies irae during my first rehearsal at the non-auditioning Edinburgh University Choir - Professor Sidney Newman pounding the piano.) Tonight Minasi’s unrelenting tempo and the chorus and orchestra’s response through to the martial conclusion is a performance which couldn’t be bettered.

I would guess that Mozart enjoyed the phonetic and onomatopoeic possibilities of the Latin text. The male singers' ‘confutatis maledictis’ in which wrongdoers are doomed to hell, is set to loud jagged music, while the following 'voca me cum Benedictus', (count me among the blessed) is a calm response from the female singers, both sections beautifully articulated and sung with precision by the SCO Chorus.

Several parts of the Sequence seem to prefigure Brahms' 'German Requiem' in providing consolation for the dying and the mourners. The Recordare', for the four soloists, and the choral Lacrimosa with its gradual crescendo are beautifully and movingly sung. All credit to director Gregory Batsleer as well as to Riccardo Minasi.

Part way though writing the Lacrimosa, Mozart died, and Süssmayr used his notes to complete the Requiem, though much is the pupil's own work – and very fine it is too. The Chorus makes light work of the 'Offertory' with its repeated fugal 'Quam olim Abraham'. The solemn Sanctus is brightened by the brass and timpani orchestration before a short and stirring counterpoint races to its Hosanna conclusion, which is repeated after strings and woodwinds accompany the ensemble soloists in the Benedictus. There’s a foreboding note in the 'Agnus Dei,' but the final 'Lux aeterna' which uses music from the first sections of the Requiem brings the work to a resounding conclusion.

Like many in the audience I believe I know the Requiem well but the mark of an outstanding performance like this is that it re-introduces us to the parts we've forgotten and re-invigorates the familiar. There are a number of younger people present who are clearly enjoying their first acquaintance with the work.

There’s lengthy applause, with some of the audience standing. This has been one of the most memorable concerts of this excellent season – which hasn’t finished yet. Maxim Emelyanchev returns to conduct the orchestra at the Queen’s Hall in Schumann’s cello concerto, with soloist Philip Higham on 7th May and in a programme of Shostakovich and Dvorak in the Usher Hall on 14th May.

The BBC recorded this concert to be broadcast on 6th May, and available on BBC Sounds for 30 days

photo credit: Christopher Bowen