Rutter Requiem

John Rutter is one of the outstanding English choral composers and arrangers of our time. He took his degrees in music at Clare College of Cambridge University and was later Director of Music at Clare College from 1975 to 1979. Rutter was elected an honorary fellow of Westminster Choir College, Princeton, in 1980 and founded the Cambridge Singers in 1981. His many masterful arrangements of songs, anthems, and carols have been performed worldwide. His own works, written in a traditional and accessible style, are almost exclusively choral. They include two children's operas and much sacred music.

Requiem was written in 1985 and first performed in October of that year. (Movement 6 was composed in 1976 as a separate anthem and later incorporated into this work.) Following a precedent set by previous composers, such as Brahms and Fauré, Rutter is not strict in the use of Latin text from the Roman Catholic Missa pro defunctis, or "Mass for the Dead". Here, he combines selected Latin texts with English texts from the Anglican Book of Common Prayer in an arch-form meditation on themes of death and life. "Sanctus," centrally positioned as Movement 4, is a joyous affirmation of Divinity; the intimate "Pie Jesu" and the "Agnus Dei," Movements 3 and 5, are personal prayers to the Christ; the blues-like "Out of the Deep" and "The Lord Is My Shepherd," Movements 2 and 6, are Psalms 130 and 23, respectively; "Requiem aeternam" and "Lux aeterna" are prayers on behalf of all humanity. Rutter links the seven movements with musical patterns based on the rhythm and melody of the opening words, "Requiem aeternam, dona eis Domine." He also pays tribute to Gregorian chant in the melody of the words "Lux aeterna"- a melody from the original Missa pro defunctis -- and in the flute solo of Movement 5. After the "Agnus Dei," as thoughts turn to life and resurrection, the flute intones the melody of "Victimae paschali laudes," a sequence sung on Easter Sunday. Requiem opens and closes on the same words, sung to the same melody, bringing the work full circle: "Requiem aeternam, dona eis Domine; et lux perpetua luceat eis" ("Grant them rest eternal, Lord our God, we pray to thee; and light perpetual shine on them forever").