Special Dossier: DEATH - Adding some Information II

In fact the two posts below are references that I’ve forgot to post in the dossier’s sequence. Anyway, due their importance in this context I’m posting them as a personal contribution.

The War Requiem was written and was first performed at Coventry Cathedral on 30th May 1962. Coventry Cathedral had been destroyed during the Battle of Britain in World War II. Britten was commissioned to write a piece for the ceremony marking the completion of a new cathedral, designed by Basil Spence, built along side the ruins of the original millenium-old structure.
The War Requiem was not meant to be a pro-British piece or a glorification of British soldiers, but a public statement of Britten's anti-war convictions. It was a denunciation of the wickedness of war, not of other men. The fact that Britten wrote the piece for three specific soloists -- a German baritone (Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau), a Russian soprano (Galina Vishnevskaya), and a British tenor (Peter Pears) -- demonstrated that he had more than the losses of his own country in mind, and symbolized the importance of reconciliation. The piece was also meant to be a warning to future generations of the senselessness of taking up arms against fellow men.

by Celso Junior