Claudio Abbado conducts Brahms’s Requiem in Vienna
This concert with Brahms’s Deutsches Requiem – recorded in Vienna’s Musikverein on the 100th anniversary of the composer’s death – is among the most memorable performances by the Berliner Philharmoniker under the baton of Claudio Abbado. It is characterised not only by its perfection and tonal beauty, but also by its feeling of humanity and empathy. The singers are Barbara Bonney and Bryn Terfel.
The profound impression made by this performance may result from a special similarity between the composer’s intentions and Claudio Abbado’s interpretation. Brahms wanted to create a “human requiem” – in other words, one that does not conform to the setting of a church service and mourns a death, but above all gives comfort to the bereaved. Thus, a requiem in German rather than in liturgically correct, if incomprehensible Latin. A similar concern characterizes this interpretation, which with all its perfection and tonal beauty, radiates a feeling of humanity and empathy.
For Claudio Abbado, this performance of the Brahms Requiem in this venue may also have had a biographical element. During his time as a student in Vienna, he attempted to sit in on the rehearsals in the Musikverein. As this was not permitted, he became a member of the choir and had the opportunity to experience the great conductors at close hand including – as a choir member for the Deutsches Requiem – Herbert von Karajan.
© 1997 EuroArts Music International
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