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Grappling with Britten’s “War Requiem” at Seattle Symphony

Winston Churchill visiting the ruins of the St. Michael’s Cathedral, Coventry, in 1941. (Photo: Capt. Horton – War Office)

The project of a particular kind of art is to instantiate in itself what is missing elsewhere. Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem (being performed again by Seattle Symphony on June 15) begins with a low growl and then the tolling of bells as it puts into yoke two incompatibilities: war and requiem. It had its premiere in 1962, at the consecration of the new Coventry Cathedral — the 14th-century version had been reduced to its walls in a German bombing raid in 1940.

Britten’s War Requiem doesn’t recreate the cathedral as a bulwark of serenity, but as a frail structure ripped open, shot through with booming bursts and siren lamentation. It’s a work with many moving parts: the traditional Mass for the dead, in Latin, glossed by nine poems in English from World War I poet Wilfred Owen. The Latin is sung by a choir, boys’ choir, and a solo soprano — in Seattle, Seattle Pro Musica bolsters the forces of the Seattle Symphony Chorale, with the youthful voices of the Northwest Boychoir, conducted by Joseph Crnko, and soprano Christine Brewer.

Anthony Dean Griffey, tenor

The tenor and baritone soloists — here, Anthony Dean Griffey and Ivan Ludlow — sing accompanied by a chamber orchestra (the principals often fearlessly exposed), almost as if they were singing art songs. They join conductor Ludovic Morlot near the front of the stage, while Brewer sings from a raised position in the back, just in front of Benaroya’s majestic pipe organ. The boys’ choir, perched up in a box, house-left, to approximate the effect of eerie distance that Britten hoped for, is also sometimes accompanied by an organ.

With the aid of Owen’s poetry, Britten interrogates, peremptorily, the promise of eternal, peaceful rest: the naiveté in boys’ prayer for “requiem aeternam,” is followed by the chastening Owen line: “What passing bells for these who die as cattle?” Sometimes it amounts to a bludgeoning. In the Offertorium section, you hear again the tale of how Abraham was about to sacrifice his son Isaac to the Lord. Griffey and Ludlow’s voices mingle in their higher registers as new instructions come: “Lay not thy hand upon the lad, / Neither do anything to him.”

Only here, Abraham refuses: the old man “slew his son, — And half the seed of Europe, one by one.”

Much has been written about Britten’s use of the tritone, often as if instability and indeterminacy (qualities attributed to the “unsettling” C–F# tritone) are the binary opposites of resolution, rather than simple states. Britten dumps it like an acid on pieties, throughout. Nothing anthemic emerges; he switches up time schemes so as not to let listeners lapse into the security of Latin chant. In fact, he’s often action-painting scenes for you, with the military bugling and staccato shouts of “Dies irae.” (Some of the chorale’s best work.) You hear the movement of large pieces of artillery in the rumbling of the double bass, explosions from percussion. At one moment, you could swear you heard a sentry’s pacing up and down.

“Lacrimosa dies illa,” sings Brewer, her vocalizations like the expulsions of a wounded or frightened killdeer. By “Sanctus,” Brewer’s desperation makes it sound like she’s yelling “Fire!” Griffey’s voice warms and opens later in the evening, gaining finally an agility and suppleness near the top, allowing him to lean into “One ever hangs,” and the summing up of “Strange Meeting,” as a soldier meets the nameless other he’s killed. Ludlow, singing capably otherwise, doesn’t bring much intensity to this critical part — a shortcoming, too, of the chorale. Morlot ties himself in knots trying to communicate the convulsive, visceral punch he’s looking for, but often it simply gets louder. Watching their faces, I could make out no one “seized with fear and trembling.”

This was opening night, which perhaps excuses an occasionally ragged launch from the choruses; I suspect that Saturday’s performance may be earth-shattering.

At St. Mark’s, Three Britten Works from Seattle Choral Company

(Photo: Seattle Choral Company)

Chorus America’s annual conference is being held in Seattle next week, from June 12 to the 15th. This is also the centenary of the great 20th century English composer Benjamin Britten’s birth, and many of his works are being performed around Seattle. The two occasions come together with the performances by Seattle Symphony, its Chorale, Seattle Pro Musica, and Seattle Boychoir of his mighty War Requiem this Thursday and Saturday at Benaroya Hall.

First however, Seattle Choral Company has played its part with a performance Saturday night at St. Mark’s Cathedral of three shorter Britten works, including the Cantata Misericordium, which some consider a postscript to the Requiem. He wrote it in 1963, the year after the premiere of the Requiem (which had been commissioned to celebrate the reconsecration of the rebuilt Coventry Cathedral after it was bombed to bits in WWII).

While the Requiem is about the horror and destructiveness of war (as Britten quotes from WWI poet Wilfred Owen: “My subject is War and the pity of War”), Cantata Misericordium is about the chances of compassionate action to relieve suffering after violence. It was commissioned by the international Red Cross to celebrate its 100th anniversary, and Britten chose to set the parable of the Good Samaritan, employing Latin as a universal language.

As he did with the Requiem he wanted soloists from previously warring countries, and for both he wanted English tenor Peter Pears, and German baritone Dietrich Fischer-Diskau.

Eric Neuville, tenor

Seattle Choral Company founder and artistic director Freddie Coleman chose tenor Eric Neuville to sing The Samaritan and baritone Charles Robert Stephens to sing The Traveler, with the full chorus as narrator and commentator and accompanied by small orchestra. These were good choices, particularly Stephens, a fine dramatic singer who portrayed expressively his apprehensiveness and fear, then fright and hurt after being set upon by the thieves. The chorus could have been a bit more outraged at the cold response from the priest at the Traveler’s calls for help, but were more shocked at the Levite’s similar response.

Neuville could have used more drama in his initial discovery of the injured man but became steadily more expressive as the work continued. Despite being in Latin, the story is so well known it was easy to follow, and the English words were side by side with the Latin ones. Britten’s music surrounds and lifts the story, spurring it onward and wrapping the whole together.

Charles Robert Stephens, baritone

Prior to the Cantata, SCC sang two 1940s works of Britten set to words of the poet W.H. Auden.  The chorus’s Cappella group opened the concert from the back of the cathedral with a fine performance of the Chorale after an Old French Carol, a stately prayer and intercession, becoming more passionate as it continues.

It followed this with the Hymn to St. Cecilia, which was less successful. After the first stanza and the repeated chorus, Auden’s words become somewhat odd and increasingly cryptic for what is usually a paean to the goddess of music, and the program notes leaned heavily on Auden’s harsh and unkind attitude towards Britten.

The music itself is glorious, but needs clarity in the harmonic lines, with the pure sopranos sounding separate, floating on top. SCC has an excellent soprano section and good soloists, but somehow the separation and the clarity weren’t there. They did better in the second section which needs to be light and almost disembodied, but somehow the whole performance felt like a painting which needs cleaning in order to see the clear colors intended by the artist, in this case, Britten. And, to really hear the music, one needs to ignore the baggage of Auden’s and Britten’s discordant relationship.

After intermission, SCC introduced the audience to the music of Norwegian composer Ola Gjeilo, with two works, Dark Night of the Soul and its companion, Luminous Night of the Soul, performed without interruption. Gjeilo uses small orchestra and piano to accompany the chorus, and his intent is to make the piano not an accompaniment but an equal partner. These are works which range from minimalist piano with long choral lines over it, to gentle slow melodies to spare harmonies to rippling piano in rich Rachmaninoff style. The combination of piano solos interleaved with the choral line works well, though words were hard to hear. Pianist Lisa Bergman handled her role with ease and excellent attention to balance with the singers.