Mozart's Requiem | Birmingham Festival Choral Society

Vaughan Williams wrote the contemplative Mass in G minor after his experiences as an ambulance driver in France in the first World War. It was the first Mass to be written in England since the reformation, and was first heard as a celebration of Mass in Westminster Cathedral in 1923.

Unlike Vaughan Williams, who lived until his mid 80s, Mozart died at the age of 35 - poignantly, while working on his Requiem Mass. Mysteries abound concerning his early demise, as well as the circumstances of the work's composition. No matter; this serene music (heard in this concert in a completed form by Sussmayer and Duncan Druce) remains a much-admired epitaph to a supremely gifted composer, spiritually uplifting to countless choirs, audiences and congregations since its first performance in 1793.