Concert - Made Holy by Their Dreams

Marking Remembrance Sunday, Reading Bach Choir presented Gerald Finzi’s deeply moving Requiem da Camera.

On 18 September 1918, Second Lieutenant Ernest Farrar was killed at the Battle of Éphy. Before enlisting, Farrar was the teenage Finzi’s first composition teacher. The tragic death of such an influential figure on the young composer led Finzi to memorialize him and all those “who went ungrudgingly, and spent their lives for us….” in the Requiem.

Two decades later, Finzi wrote Lo, the full, final sacrifice for the consecration of St. Matthew’s Church, Northampton. This festival anthem is a reflection on the translations of St. Thomas Aquinas by 17th-century metaphysical poet and cleric Richard Crashaw.

J.S. Bach’s motet Komm, Jesu, komm, BWV 229 completes and complements this programme. The richly varied double-chorus work highlights the Baroque master’s inventive musical ideas alongside his rich faith.

Kindly sponsored by Finzi Friends