Forces combine for epic performance of Verdi’s Requiem

Local favourite Anna Pierard will be performing as a soloist in this rendition of Verdi’s Requiem.

The power of Verdi’s Requiem is immeasurable, demanding a large choir and orchestra.

For the performances on October 27 and 29 at Waiapu Cathedral, Napier Civic Choir’s numbers will be swelled by students from Hastings Boys’ High School and Project Prima Volta, with Hawke’s Bay Orchestra and the invited musicians numbering 55.

Soloists are dazzling Australian soprano Lisa Harper-Brown, local favourite Anna Pierard, a mezzo-soprano, and Project Prima Volta graduates Taylor Wallbank and Sam McKeever. The conductor is Jose Aparicio.

The Requiem represented Verdi’s first major work that was not an opera, and when he did compose a requiem mass, it was always going to be unconventional.

Described at the time as “Verdi’s latest opera, though in ecclesiastical robes”, it was a work born not primarily out of religious devotion, but out of emotion and intense loss at the deaths of two fellow Italian artists, Rossini and Manzoni.

Verdi was essentially an agnostic, but he recognised the power of the Catholic requiem text to respond to the death of a person beloved.

Australian soprano Lisa Harper-Brown.

Throughout its varied sections, it expresses a gamut of emotions, from grief to anger and hope.

There is dramatic contrast, from the dark and mournful opening to the earth-shattering drum strokes and raging chords of the Dies Irae (Day of Wrath), the heavenly and angelic view of the day of judgement of the Sanctus, and the final Libera me (Deliver me), in which a terrified soprano pleads for salvation.

Verdi’s personal telling of this most dramatic of texts has always had the power to move audiences, and its continued success stands as a testament to its effectiveness.

On Saturday, October 28, HBO will present a concert of composers who have inspired Hollywood - classical music as if you were at the movies. Prokofiev and Berlioz are on the programme, along with Korngold’s Violin Concerto, which will be performed by Amalia Hall.

The Details

What: Verdi’s Requiem

When: 7.30pm on Friday, October 27 and 2.30pm on Sunday, October 29

Where: Waiapu Cathedral, Browning Street, Napier

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What: Prokofiev, Korngold, Berlioz

When: 7.30pm on Saturday, October 28

Where: Waiapu Cathedral, Browning Street, Napier

Tickets available from iTicket or door sales - Eftpos available. Adults $35; SuperGold card-holders $32; tertiary students $10; free entry for those under 17.