Mozart's Requiem K. 626

[Bogey]

Mozart's Requiem K.626:

So, what are your favorite recordings?
Does this piece do much for you, or do you find it overly hyped because it was Wolfie's last?
What stories have you read or been told about the piece? (rumors and conjecture are welcome)
Should Constanze have left it alone as it was and we have an unfinished piece?
Are there recordings of just the parts actually done by Mozart?
Do you have a different recorded version than what we normally hear?

In short, anything about this piece is welcomed.  It is one of the few compositions where I will buy a used copy without even a test listen just to see what the conductor and crew can do with it.  I look forward to your posts.

[Gurn Blanston]

Golly gosh, Bill, you're just full of questions tonight! 

OK, well yes, I do have a favorite version, which, at the same time, also answers your question about a recording of just the Mozart parts. Try the Amazon link here, to see what I was thinking.



As for all the background, I will be delighted to go into it if no one else takes the opportunity. Do I find it overly hyped? Well, I don't find it hyped at all actually. Hardly anyone talks about it, unless I've missed it. It really is a nice piece of music. I don't think it is the greatest thing he ever wrote, but as Requia go, it is a fine one.





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Listening to:
Collegium Musicum 90 / Hickox - Hob 01 101 Symphony in D 'Clock"  1st mvmt - Adagio - Presto

[Bogey]

Just added to my wish list, buddy!  How does it sound stripped down?  HIP?

[Gurn Blanston]

Just added to my wish list, buddy!  How does it sound stripped down?  HIP?

Well, it is unquestionably HIP. This orchestra is superb. The Amazon reviewers are correct to home in on the tempi; some of them DO defy expectations. Not just faster in places, but also slower. It isn't a one-way street. The original autograph parts do sound rather lacking in orchestration (after all, they were!) but not at all barren. More like a chamber work than an orchestral one, so to speak.



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Listening to:
Collegium Musicum 90 / Hickox - Hob 01 101 Symphony in D 'Clock"  2nd mvmt - Andante

[Bogey]

Well, it is unquestionably HIP. This orchestra is superb. The Amazon reviewers are correct to home in on the tempi; some of them DO defy expectations. Not just faster in places, but also slower. It isn't a one-way street. The original autograph parts do sound rather lacking in orchestration (after all, they were!) but not at all barren. More like a chamber work than an orchestral one, so to speak.



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Listening to:
Collegium Musicum 90 / Hickox - Hob 01 101 Symphony in D 'Clock"  2nd mvmt - Andante

Ah, so we are not just talking length, but instruments composed for as well.

[Brahmsian]

Mozart's Requiem K.626:

do you find it overly hyped because it was Wolfie's last?

No way, dude!  It's one of my first loves, for both WAM and Classical Music in general.   I'm very fond of it, definitely one of my top 5 favorite Mozart works.

I haven't listened to it in awhile, so thanks for that reminder.  I'll remedy that tomorrow! 

[Gurn Blanston]

Ah, so we are not just talking length, but instruments composed for as well.

Oh yes, right off the original score, whatever is in his handwriting. You know how he composed, yes? He wrote out parts one at a time. So he wrote horizontally rather than vertically, if that makes sense. His usual practice was to compose the leading voice parts first and then going back to the beginning to fill in the orchestration. So basically that's what you have here.



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Listening to:
Collegium Musicum 90 / Hickox - Hob 01 101 Symphony in D 'Clock"  4th mvmt - Finale: Vivace

[Brahmsian]

There is a recent recording of this for string quartet, has anyone heard the Requiem in this version?

[Bogey]

Oh yes, right off the original score, whatever is in his handwriting. You know how he composed, yes? He wrote out parts one at a time. So he wrote horizontally rather than vertically, if that makes sense. His usual practice was to compose the leading voice parts first and then going back to the beginning to fill in the orchestration. So basically that's what you have here.



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Listening to:
Collegium Musicum 90 / Hickox - Hob 01 101 Symphony in D 'Clock"  4th mvmt - Finale: Vivace

Cool!

[Sorin Eushayson]

Well, it is unquestionably HIP. This orchestra is superb. The Amazon reviewers are correct to home in on the tempi; some of them DO defy expectations. Not just faster in places, but also slower. It isn't a one-way street. The original autograph parts do sound rather lacking in orchestration (after all, they were!) but not at all barren. More like a chamber work than an orchestral one, so to speak.

Heck yeah, Gurn!  I love that recording!!!  The real Mozart Requiem, not Sussmayr's!

Of course, if you want to go for Sussmayr's completion you won't be able to beat this...



Phenomenal.

[Bulldog]

The version I turn to most frequently is the Schreier.

[Valentino]

Interesting, Bulldog. I bought that one as my first recording on Penguins recommendation way back when.
Almost never played it because I didn't warm to it.
Then I got the CMW/Harnoncourt. That's something else. I saw Böhm's in DG111. I have to play that one soon.

Thanks for the thread, Bogey!

[PerfectWagnerite]

Amongst the half dozen or so recordings of this work the one I keep popping in the player when I feel like listening to this piece is this one;



This is about as perfect a recording of this work as you can get. The soloists are fantastic, McNair especially, and the playing is dark and pliant, on modern instruments.

The Schreier is also wonderful as well.

[MN Dave]

I have Bernstein.

I don't listen to it much. 

[Sorin Eushayson]

I have Bernstein.

I don't listen to it much. 

That's probably a good thing! 

[Franco]

What I have.

[Que]

Hogwood is my 1st choice on the  Mass in C minor, but on the Requiem it is Bruno Weil's stripped down version:



Q

[jochanaan]

I have Bernstein.

I don't listen to it much. 

That's probably a good thing! 

On the other hand, I have the 1956 Bruno Walter/New York Philharmonic recording, with soloists Irmgard Seefried, Jennie Tourel, Leopold Simoneau, and William Warfield; and it's just lovely: slower and fuller than modern tastes dictate, but a beautiful, sure-handed performance.

[Bogey]

Interesting, Bulldog. I bought that one as my first recording on Penguins recommendation way back when.
Almost never played it because I didn't warm to it.
Then I got the CMW/Harnoncourt. That's something else. I saw Böhm's in DG111. I have to play that one soon.

Thanks for the thread, Bogey!

Did Böhm record this more than once, as his '71 is my go to on the shelf?

[Elgarian]

Does this piece do much for you, or do you find it overly hyped because it was Wolfie's last?

It marked the beginning of a Mozartian revolution for me. I was in Lyme Regis for a week, and there was a bookshop in the town that sold Naxos CDs, and I resolved (being in holiday mood and game for anything), to buy, each day, a CD of something that normally I'd never seriously consider buying. I had no interest in Mozart and most particularly had never listened to any of his vocal music apart from a few arias on a 'Highlights from Don Giovanni' album. In fact I thought Mozart was mostly dull, dull, dull. But this was in the rack at the shop:



I'd not only never heard it; I'd never heard of it. So I bought it and played it that evening. The lid blew off:
'Whoa, stop, wait! This is Mozart? Have they got the label wrong?'
The lid never went back on, after that. So no, I don't think it's over-hyped.