Romsey Choral Society - Mozart's Great Mass in C minor

We will remember them - These words are said every year in November at the Service of Remembrance at the Cenotaph and at services throughout the UK. Romsey Choral Society has established a tradition of annual remembrance with performances in Romsey Abbey of the monumental works of great composers. This November will be no different. On Saturday the twelfth the Society will mark the centenary of the 1916 Battle of the Somme with Mozart’s contrapuntal masterpiece the Great Mass in C minor and Charpentier’s triumphal Te Deum.

At the time he composed his Great Mass Mozart was just twenty-two years old and engaged to Constanze Weber. His fiancée became seriously ill and once she recovered Mozart felt compelled to fulfil a vow he had made in a time of great emotional turmoil to compose the Mass in thanks for her life. This he did, and there has never been any doubt about the intense emotional depth and musical skill of this work, despite Mozart’s admission the work was unfinished; parts of the Credo and Sanctus are not intact, and the work was completed later by others. Happily, after their marriage, Constanze was well enough to sing the beautiful first soprano solos in the Salzburg premiere in 1783.

Baroque composer Marc-Antoine Charpentier composed his Te Deum in D major while he was in the service of the French Dauphin as Musical Director at the Jesuit Church of Saint Louis in Paris. It was written to celebrate the victory of the French at the Battle of Steenkirk in 1692. The joyful trumpet calls of the lively opening ‘marche en rondeau’ reflect the military aspect of the composition and will be familiar to many as the Eurovision fanfare.

Romsey Choral Society is delighted to be performing with the Southern Sinfonia, the chamber orchestra in residence at the University of Winchester and the Corn Exchange. This Remembrance Concert programme brings together a hymn of praise for deliverance and a grand affirmation of belief in the ancient building and wonderful acoustic of Romsey Abbey.