Requiem by Novoselie, Questa Musica

Requiem (from Latin requies - "rest") is a high genre of concert sacred music, a kind of mourning oratorio.

Even the above phrase is little understood by the general public, not to mention the names and meaning of the Latin psalms of the canonical Requiem. As for people who are knowledgeable, for example by virtue of belonging to the Catholic Church of the Latin rite, even for them, I am sure, these texts are devoid of the burning apocalyptic meaning with which they were filled for a person in the Baroque era or in earlier times.

The same is true of the Orthodox analogs of the requiem Mass. Due to its archaic nature, for a person who has not been involved since childhood in the scope, sound and meaning of the Church Slavonic language, the text is often simply incomprehensible, and if understood, then, with few exceptions, it is perceived formally, as some template phrases and its perception is deprived of the relevance of involvement with the human feeling of loss and prayerful ecstasy, except when a person is personally confronted with such a loss.

It is these considerations, as well as in general my love for some of the older genres, such as the "Petrine cantos", or the "courtois arias", and the desire to make them relevant again, accessible to modern man, that led me to reflect on the basic tenets of the Requiem psalms, the "bearing" meanings of each psalm. Also the series of events accompanying a person of my time and geographical location contributed to these reflections, which formed the basis of the text.

As for the music, I stayed true to my concept of "modern music for ancient instruments" and the instrumentation was based on my favorite consort of viols. However, the globality of the theme and the images of the apocalypse that haunted me required me to expand the vocal line-up considerably, and in addition to the soloists, this 11-part oratorio features a choir of sinful and/or righteous souls. Also the reverie of the Last Judgment scenes and trumpeting angels led me to include in the score the zinc (cornette), a Renaissance wind instrument of unprecedented beauty of sound and percussion, which contribute to the synthesis of the baroque aesthetics of the Requiem with the rocker drive inherent in some of its parts.

Thus, during two and a half months spent in apocalyptic, but at the same time very real visions of burning cities, scorched fields, a multitude of human souls appearing before the Supreme Throne, etc., 11 parts of Requiem were created, which are presented on this album.

Roust Poziumski

FANCYMUSIC is a record label focused on contemporary new music recordings. FANCYMUSIC is a broad platform for a wide variety of contemporary new music composed by different russian musicians. FANCYMUSIC is also a platform on which newer names may be encountered.

fancymusic.ru
Facebook
vk.com
SoundCloud