In Memoriam: in memory of World War I

Description

In Memoriam was the Paris Choral Society’s contribution to the commemoration of the Armistice signed on 11 November, 1918, in the forest of Compiègne and a recognition of the waste and horror of the more than 16 million military and civilian deaths resulting from the Great War of 1914-18. The works we performed in this concert deal with death and mourning in different ways and are by composers and authors of texts from several nations and across centuries.

We sung the following works:

* Mozart Requiem  (ed. R. Levin)
* Jehan Alain Requiem
* Mauersberger Wie liegt die Stadt so wüst
* Vaughan Williams Toward the Unknown Region

While none of these works was specifically written about, or composed at the time of, the 1918 Armistice, the universality of the themes of death and war permeate these works and the final one, Toward the Unknown Region, provides a glimmer of hope for the future.