On That Distant Day
Maurice Duruflé | Requiem, Op. 9
Frank Martin | Cantate pour le 1er Août
Palestrina | Missa Papae Marcelli
Diedre Robinson | World Premiere
Eric Plutz, organ
The Thirteen performs works of remembrance and celebration with Duruflé’s poignant Requiem and, in honor of the 500th anniversary of Palestrina’s birth, the composer’s most renowned work, the Missa Papae Marcelli. Palestrina’s mass represents the high point of Renaissance polyphony, with a purity of counterpoint, deeply affecting dissonance, and clear text setting—qualities that formed the basis of an enduring myth that through this work, Palestrina saved Church music. Duruflé’s 1941 Requiem, also based on Gregorian chant, was begun under the Vichy occupation but completed after the liberation of France. Paired with Swiss composer Frank Martin’s celebratory 1941 Cantata pour le 1er août (the text of which inspires this concert’s title) and a new work by composer Diedre Robinson, this concert is sure to “transfigure the listener” (The Washington Post). Princeton University Chapel organist Erik Plutz, hailed as a “master craftsman… sensitive, emotional, stunningly accurate, and spectacularly musical… world-class” (The Diapason) joins The Thirteen in this tour-de-force performance.
The commissioning of the World Premiere by Diedre Robinson is made possible by a gift to The Thirteen’s Building for Tomorrow fund by Donald Sutherland and Phyllis Bryn-Julson.