Requiem Novum
Requiem Novum was written for the Swedish composer Mårten Jansson in 2018. The premise of this work was to add new movements to the traditional Latin Requiem Mass, creating a response for each movement from the perspective of the deceased. Mårten created the work for chorus, orchestra, and soprano soloist, with the chorus performing the Latin texts, and the soloist representing the deceased.
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This work was premiered in Uppsala, Sweden, in January 2020, with the fabulous recording with Barnaby Smith conducting VOCES 8, Apollo5, Anna Dennis, and the Philharmonia Orchestra was created in 2022.
Program Notes
Writing about death and dying and grief is never an easy thing. After my late wife, Julie, died in 2005, I found it difficult to write about what I was feeling. It took a decade or more for words to flow freely from my heart about her passing, and what that loss meant to me. I was able to write a series of texts for various composers, beginning with Stuart Turnbull and Susan LaBarr. These early explorations of my grief were crucial steps to unlock the flood of poetry that would later come. Two major works--Eric Whitacre's The Sacred Veil and Mårten Jansson's Requiem Novum--are each in their own way deep dives into my psyche at that time of opening up. I am forever grateful to Mårten for giving me the opportunity to reflect more spiritually on death and eternity than I was able to with The Sacred Veil.
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The texts each respond to the traditional movements of the Latin Requiem Mass, but from the perspective of the deceased. We who grieve are trapped on this side of eternity, and we experience loss, and the pain of separation. But they who have passed have crossed over into eternity, where time and space have no meaning. From their perspective all is present bliss, and we are already together with them there, and always have been. There was comfort for me in that thought. I imagined Julie speaking to me through this poetry, assuring me that there is nothing to fear or lament or atone for, for across the veil none of that has any relevance.
Full Text of the New Movements
I - INTROITUS
Or so the living pray
For their beloved dead,
And pure is their intention so to do;
But the living only see
As through a glass, darkly,
the great Enigma that awaits beyond,
Where glimpse of Truth, and grief,
And darker shadows still,
Entwine to weave the old familiar words.
Do not grieve, my friends,
That I have gone away,
For I have crossed into Infinity
Where now I know the answers
To questions hidden then
When still I stood where now you stand and grieve.
II - KYRIE
Cry not in anguished voices
For gifts already given;
He sees the pain our choices
Inflict on hopes of heaven.
It is we who must have mercy,
Each one upon another;
Whyever would one curse
Him who is himself our brother?
The Lord has mercy boundless
And that He freely gives;
Our fear of death is groundless,
For he who died now lives!
III - DIES IRAE
On that day of weeping
There is no weeping here;
For here there is only Heaven,
Here there is only joy,
And God is only Love.
The torments we fear are real;
For once we are enfolded
In the perfect love of God—
Gentle, boundless, freely given—
We remember past transgressions,
Our selfishness and self-delusion.
To stand in our shame
Before such terrible love
Is exquisite torment,
And we become our own tormentors.
But just as stone is worn away
By endless washing of the sea,
So the stubborn spines of our illusion
And the armor of our pride
Are sanded down to the raw—
However long it may require—
Until, at last,
We lay aside our heavy burdens
And accept the indescribable gift.
Abandon your illusions
And die before you die,
So on that day you cross the veil
And slip into eternity,
You will fall headlong
Into Love, into Joy,
Into the waiting arms of God.
IV – SANCTUS
I stand upon a landscape of infinity
Vast, yet intimate
In the distance I see the Presence,
Glowing with impossible light;
The thrum of hosts beyond number
Surrounds me as they sing
Their endless Holy! Holy!
Wave upon wave of Love
Emanate from that light,
While lightning flashes
Of golden evangelion
Carry prayers and blessings
To and from the Presence.
Holy! Holy!
Drawn into the Light,
I fade,
I lose myself...
Holy! Holy!
There is no I
There is only We
Only the endless and eternal One
I cannot describe...
Words fail...
Holy! Holy! Holy!
V – LUX AETERNA
Light is always and everywhere!
Light,
Bursting forth from the hearts
of a billion billion stars;
Reflecting and refracting
across infinite space;
Light,
In the prismic flashing fire
from a diamond’s heart;
In the crackling bolt
of white-hot lightning;
In the soft golden glow
of summer sun,
Softened to silver
by the smiling moon;
Light,
Carried in the mouths
of countless angels
Sent from the source
of all Love;
Pouring from the face of God
a blessing for all time;
And Light,
Shining forth
from our own fragile hearts,
Magnifying multitudes,
liberating infinite Love.
VI - PIE JESU
Eternal Rest.
Eternal Rest?
No rest for me;
My journey has only just begun!
VII - IN PARADISUM
Here, on the other side of eternity,
I need not await your coming,
For we are already together,
As always we have been.
Here, on the other side of eternity,
Time and space have no meaning,
For past and future fall away,
And there is only ever now.
Here, on the other side of eternity,
There are no limits of thought,
Or dimension, or understanding,
For here, all is known,
All is compassed,
And all is infinite, perfect L