Giuseppe Verdi’s ‘Requiem’ will be performed by the Westminster Symphonic Choir and Festival Orchestra.
By: Susan Van Dongen
Bass-baritone Simon Estes has performed in all the major international opera companies around the world in Milan, Paris, London, Barcelona, Berlin, Hamburg, Munich and Vienna, to name just a few. He’s worked with American symphony orchestras from New York to San Francisco, but he’s never sung in Princeton.
"I’ve sung on every continent around the world, except Antarctica I’m waiting for the penguins to invite me," he says. "But I’ve never performed in Princeton, so I’m looking forward to it very, very much."
Invited by his friend and colleague, soprano Sharon Sweet, an associate professor at Westminster Choir College of Rider University, Mr. Estes will be in Princeton to sing the bass "role" in Giuseppe Verdi’s Requiem. Joe Miller, recently appointed director of choral activities at Westminster, conducts the Westminster Symphonic Choir accompanied by the Westminster Festival Orchestra. It will be Mr. Miller’s first performance conducting the choir with orchestra, and he couldn’t have picked a more stirring piece of music.
Westminster adjunct Melanie Sonnenberg will sing the mezzo-soprano part and Scott McCoy, a professor of piano and pedagogy at Westminster, will sing the tenor role. The concert will be held March 24 at Princeton University Chapel on the campus of Princeton University.
It is not inappropriate to use the word "role" when describing the vocal parts, since some describe the Requiem as "Verdi’s greatest opera."
"Even though it is a requiem, there is great drama to it and it’s operatic in many ways," Mr. Estes says, speaking from his studio in Boston. "It is truly one of the greatest works ever created. I’ve sung all the most famous requiems by Faure, Mozart, Brahms and Britten, and the Verdi is the most exciting of all, with all the brass and the magnificent orchestration. It’s an unbelievable work for the chorus, conductor and orchestra."
For those familiar with the piece, the soprano is the most likely star of the Requiem, with a long, impassioned a cappella aria at the end of the work. But the tenor, mezzo soprano and bass get a strenuous workout.
"Verdi wrote it well for all the voices we all have to work hard," Mr. Estes says. "And there are several places where he wrote wonderful ensembles including a trio and quartet. People remember the soprano because she ends the work, but all the other voices have great and graceful music to sing."
Westminster has had a long association with Verdi’s Requiem. The choir performed the piece more than 20 times, with leading orchestras and conductors such as Riccardo Muti with the Philadelphia Orchestra. It was the featured work in the Westminster Symphonic Choir’s first Live at Lincoln Center broadcast in 1980. On Sept. 11, 2002, the choir performed it with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra and Zdenek Macal in the first public television broadcast, A Requiem for Sept. 11, commemorating the first anniversary of the terrorist attacks on America. Mr. Estes also has performed the Requiem with the Westminster Symphonic Choir, with the Philadelphia Orchestra and Eugene Ormandy.
It seemed particularly apropos to hear the Requiem honor those who died on Sept. 11, 2001 which turned the political tide of America but both Mr. McCoy and Mr. Estes don’t know of any political overtones to the piece, which Verdi wrote in memory of a friend.
"It is always appropriate to perform (the Requiem) it’s one of the most spectacular pieces ever written," Mr. McCoy says. "In fact, you will find that there are groups of people who travel around the U.S. just to listen to performances of the work. It’s more operatic than other requiems. It contains the complete liturgical text (of a requiem Mass) but was written in a more operatic medium.
"But I don’t see any political overtones, just a piece that is beautiful and moving at times and exciting and breathtaking at other times," he adds. "It’s very demanding of the soloists and the audience, but greatly rewarding for all of them. The tenor gets a couple of very nice arias and the mezzo also gets to be a star. That’s often not the case, but with this piece she gets some wonderful things to sing."
Like Mr. Estes, the Verdi Requiem is "an old friend" to Mr. McCoy. Both men can almost sing it in their sleep.
"I first sang it in a chorus back in 1975 and have done numerous performances since then," Mr. McCoy says. "I only look at the score as a reference. It’s pretty deep inside of me. And it’s a marvelous opportunity to showcase Joe Miller. The ‘Requiem’ is such a milestone of the choral repertoire, but also the musical repertoire, period. For musicians it’s a piece that would appear on their top-10 lists of all-time favorites maybe even on their top five."
Giuseppe Verdi’s Requiem will be performed by the Westminster Symphonic Choir conducted by Joe Miller, with the Westminster Festival Orchestra, at Princeton University Chapel, Nassau and Washington streets, Princeton, March 24, 8 p.m. Tickets cost $15-$45. For information, call (609) 921-2663. On the web: www.rider.edu

