Verdi: Requiem / Myung-Whun Chung

Giuseppe Verdi's Requiem, one of the most powerful scores ever written, is performed at the Auditorium Parco della Musica as part of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia's Symphonic Music Season. The South Korean maestro Myung-Whun Chung, the score's chosen interpreter, leads the Orchestra and Chorus of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, supported by an excellent vocal cast.

The concert offers one of the most fascinating pieces of the sacred repertoire, considered the most important symphonic-choral composition in the Italian repertoire. The idea of ​​composing a Requiem Mass had been in Verdi's mind since 1868, the year of Gioachino Rossini's death, but it was never realized; the opportunity to return to it arose a few years later, with the passing of another central figure in Italian culture, the writer Alessandro Manzoni, for whom the composer held great admiration. The Requiem was composed in 1874 and performed that same year, on the first anniversary of the death of the author of the Promessi sposi (The Betrothed), debuting in the Church of San Marco in Milan under the direction of Verdi himself.

Myung-Whun Chung therefore takes us on a dizzying journey through the most extreme human emotions in the face of death, creating a deeply moving and shocking soundscape.

Orchestra and Chorus of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia
Conductor: Myung-Whun Chung
Soprano: Ailyn Pérez
Mezzo-soprano: Ekaterina Semenchuk
Tenor: René Barbera
Bass: Roberto Tagliavini
Chorus Master: Andrea Secchi

Photo: the Auditorium Parco della Musica official site