Manchester Collective: A Little Requiem

Ferruccio Busoni Berceuse élégiaque (arr. Schoenberg) (9″)
Aaron Copland Appalachian Spring (25″)
Henryk Gorecki Kleines Requiem für eine Polka (24″)

Artists have always been obsessed by endings. Whether it’s nightfall, a broken heart, fire or frost – there’s a savage beauty to impermanence. In A Little Requiem, two composers explore the end of life, while a third voice rejoices in the vitality and innocence of Spring.

From the softly rocking lullaby of Busoni’s Berceuse to the tolling bell of Górecki’s Kleines Requiem, these evocative bookends conjure up vivid and haunting musical worlds. It’s soft and strangely calm… until it isn’t. The stillness of Górecki’s first movement soon explodes into the thrilling mania of his furious allegros. This is a music of total extremes.

Between these two meditations on mortality stands Copland’s evergreen Appalachian Spring – pure, beautiful, and almost childlike. Listening to it now feels like a return to a more innocent time.