Description

Celebrating John Rutter’s 80th birthday and the 40th anniversary of his Requiem

If there’s such a thing as a gentle apocalypse, Fauré and Rutter composed it. These two requiems—separated by nearly a century but kindred in spirit—turn away from fire-and-brimstone visions toward something far more human: consolation.

Gabriel Fauré’s Requiem in D minor, completed in the 1890s, has often been described as a “lullaby of death.” Where Verdi gives us trumpets and terror, Fauré offers serenity: muted strings, sighing choirs, and the radiant promise of In Paradisum. It’s the music of a man more interested in grace than judgment, and it remains one of the most beloved works in the choral canon precisely because it refuses to frighten its audience into piety.

Nearly a hundred years later, John Rutter took up the same theme—this time through the lens of late-20th-century warmth and cinematic color. His Requiem (1985) merges the traditional Latin text with English psalms, written in memory of his father and shaped by his Anglican sensibility. Lush harmonies and flowing melodies make it unmistakably Rutter: devotional without austerity, spiritual without sermon.

Hearing the two side by side, one senses the continuity of compassion in sacred music—a lineage that treats mourning not as a punishment, but as the tender work of remembering. Together they invite listeners to rest, reflect, and, perhaps, believe—if only for an hour—that beauty itself is a form of faith.

Featuring:

Cynthia Johnson
Janelle Wagoner
Andrew Owen

Masterworks Concert #1: Requiems by Gabriel Fauré and John Rutter