The Donegal Voices choir and their director, Mountcharles based Andrew Batchelor will make a very welcome return for the fourth year running to perform Mozart’s Requiem in D minor.
The choir will perform at the Bluestacks Festival in Ballyshannon on Friday, October 5 at 8:00pm and on Sunday, October 7 at 8:00pm at St Mary’s Church, Stranorlar.
Following last year’s tremendous success with their performances of Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus and The Coronation Anthems, the choir have put together their very own Chamber Orchestra to join them for one of the best-loved and most important works of the classical, sacred repertoire – Mozart’s Requiem.
The Donegal Voices is a four-part mixed choir with Members from all parts of the county, from Dunfanaghy to Bundoran.
Each year the choir come together in preparation for the year. The hard work begins in February, with members meeting regularly in Donegal Town to rehearse, culminating in two performances every October, one of which is part of the Bluestacks Festival.
Mozart was originally commissioned by Count Von Walsegg of Vienna to write the Requiem to commemorate the first anniversary of the untimely death of this young wife Anna, on Valentine’s Day, 1791.
Mozart himself was in poor health when he commenced the work and he died some months later, in December 1791, before he could complete it.
His wife Constanze, however, arranged for several of his composer friends, most notably Franz Xavier Sussmayr, to complete the commission and deliver it, on time, to the grieving Count.
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