Eternal Light - A Requiem

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Talking about composing the work, Howard said – “Most requiems are based, one way or another, on the medieval church’s Mass for the Dead, which is made up of a series of sections (‘movements’) beginning with the ‘Kyrie Eleison’ (Greek meaning Lord have mercy) and ending with ‘In Paradisum’ (Into paradise). Although the traditional requiem text calls for ‘eternal peace, rest and light’ for those who have died, it also emphasises judgement and everlasting damnation for anyone who transgresses the Roman Catholic Church’s code of behaviour, as seen from the perspective of the Middle Ages. I did not feel at ease with this approach to the appalling pain of loss and grief, so in an attempt to provide some solace for the living that mourn, I stripped down the old Latin texts to a few phrases in each movement and laid beside them words from English poems from across the last 500 years. Primus igitur angelus clanxit, et facta est grando et ignis, mista sanguine, projectaque sunt in terram: et tertia pars arborum exusta est, et omne gramen viride exustum.

And the third angel blew, and there fell a great star from heaven burning as it were a lamp, and it fell into the third part of the rivers, and into fountains of waters, and the name of the star is called Wormwood. And the third part was turned to wormwood. And many men died of the waters because they were made bitter.And I beheld and heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice: Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the earth because of the voices to come of the trumpet of the three angels which were yet to blow. The first angel blew, and there was made hail and fire, which were mingled with blood, and they were cast in to the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt, and all green grass was burnt.

The technique of placing English poetry with fragments of the Latin, often sung simultaneously or antiphonally between soloist and choir, characterises the whole work. One section of Latin text comes not from the Requiem mass but from the Book of Revelation, with its description of the coming of the Angels of the Apocalypse. The Recordare movement combines with Phineas Fletcher’s early-17 th century sacred poem Drop, drop, slow tears. Other texts are drawn from Francis Quarles, Mary Elizabeth Frye and Ann Thorp. And, as the composer said recently, “although it was not deliberately conceived thus, it is powerfully appropriate that the central Dies Irae movement takes as its vision of hell the horror of armed conflict. Alongside the Latin text phrases I have juxtaposed John McCrae’s haunting war poem In Flanders Fields. McCrae, a Canadian military doctor of great distinction, died on the Western Front in January 1918.” I took what you might call a Brahmsian route. Brahms broke with tradition by selecting German-language texts not found in the ancient Latin funeral rite and by his intention that the Requiem could provide solace to the grieving who live on, rather than dire warnings of damnation, or pleas for the departed as they linger in purgatory. Deinde quartus angelus clanxit, et percussa est tertia pars solis, et tertia pars lunæ, et tertia pars stellarum: ita ut obscuraretur tertia pars eorum, et diei non luceret pars tertia, et noctis similiter. Tum angelus tertius clanxit, et cecidit e cœlo stella magna, ardens velut lampas, ceciditque in tertiam partem fluminum, et in fontes aquarum. Nomen autem stellæ dicitur Absinthium: versa est igitur tertia pars aquarum in absinthium, et multi homines mortui sunt ex aquis, quod amaræ factæ essent.The Catholic liturgical template from which all those famous Requiems stem, the Missa Pro Defunctis, takes as its basic premise the notion that the living intercede on behalf of the souls of the departed in the hope they are granted everlasting life. In this tradition, all humans are deemed sinners by virtue simply of being human, never mind what else they might have got up to, and are urgently in need of our prayers and supplications. There is an emphasis in settings from the Middle Ages to the Enlightenment on judgement, hellfire and damnation, an emphasis that Berlioz and Verdi hammered home with their famously cataclysmic Dies Irae movements. Eternal Light: A Requiem is also distinguished by the inclusion of English poetry, mixed with fragments of Latin, sung simultaneously or antiphonally between the soloists and the choir. Goodall explains, “One section of Latin text comes not from the Requiem mass but from the Book of Revelation, with its description of the coming of the Angels of the Apocalypse. The Recordare movement combines with Phineas Fletcher’s early-17th century sacred verse Drop, drop, slow tears. Other texts are drawn from John McCrae, Francis Quarles, Mary Elizabeth Frye and Ann Thorp.” EMI Classics is proud to release Eternal Light: A Requiem, a new work by the award-winning British composer and internationally acclaimed broadcaster, Howard Goodall. Goodall’s unusual setting of the liturgical service is performed by Christ Church Cathedral Choir, Oxford and London Musici conducted by Stephen Darlington with soloists Natasha Marsh, Alfie Boe and Christopher Maltman. The result of this collaboration is a work that should appeal to a broad-based audience. Following the premiere, Rambert Dance Company will tour Eternal Light nationally across the UK. Over seventy dates have already been confirmed, including the London premiere, which will take place at Sadler’s Wells on Armistice Day (November 11), the 90th anniversary of the end of World War I. Requiem aeternam (everlasting peace) – Kyrie Eleison – ‘Close now thine eyes and rest secure, thy soul is safe enough, thy body sure’