Mozart’s Requiem
Lately, I have learned the meaning of the word humility in many ways. One was listening to Mozart’s Requiem being performed live by the Wimbledon Choral Society and the Brandenburg sinfonia at the church St. Martin-in-the-Fields on Trafalgar Square, London. Perhaps it is fitting that Mozart’s last unfinished piece was a requiem mass of such beauty and splendor. When he was commissioned to compose it, Mozart was in such poor health, that he remarked to his wife that he was writing his own funeral mass. Originally composed in 1791, the requiem is still being played in 2014. I wonder how much of the music produced in the past fifty years will survive the next two centuries. Einstein was an unconditional fan of Mozart and listening especially to the first few bars of “Dies Irae” and “Lacrimosa”, it is not difficult to understand why. If any musician ever spoke with God, it surely must have been Wolfgang Amadeus.