Opera in Roma - W. A. Mozart - Requiem

The Requiem Mass K 626 in D minor, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's last unfinished work, represents a labyrinth of contradictions and mysteries that over time has divided historians and musicologists, fueling conjectures and igniting passions. Mozart completed only the Introit: Requiem aeternam, and wrote the main parts of the opera, indicating the melodic motif of the accompaniment from time to time. Kyrie, Sequentia (with the Lacrimosa stopping after the first eight bars) and the Offertorium arrived at this stage.

After Mozart's death, his wife Constanze delegated the completion of the Requiem to her husband's three pupils, in order to get closer to the original intentions of the work, but only Franz Xaver Süssmayr continued the work, homogeneously rearranging the work of the previous collaborators and completing the totally missing passages of the manuscript. From the very first notes there is a sense of anguish, it is as if the author was afraid of death and judgment and it is as if it were already present.

Mariangela Cafaro, soprano
Olivia Andreini, mezzo soprano
Delfo Paone, tenor
Ferruccio Finetti, bass baritone
Coro Accademia Vocale Romana e Coro La Fenice
Orchestra Sinfonica Città di Roma
Barbara Cattabiani and Claudia Agostini, piano
Sandra Cepero Alvarez, conductor

program

W. A. MOZART
Requiem in Re minore K 626

Place

St. Paul’s Within the Walls Church is the most beautiful Anglican Church in Rome, located in Castro Pretorio district, in Via Nazionale. It’s an episcopal church of America, the first non-Catholic church built in Rome after the Unification of Italy. The glass window particularly stands out with scenes from the Life of Saints, along with the mosaics of the apse, representing several Fathers of the Church; the curious thing is that some characters from the 19th century were used to represent someone else: Sant’Andrea has Abraham Lincoln’s face, San Giacomo is Giuseppe Garibaldi, San Patrizio is General Grant, one of the American Secession War’s protagonist. Entering the Church, you will leave outside the Roman antiquities, the frenzy and the traffic noise, discovering a place where it is possible to think and ponder inside a real artwork.