Britten and the "War Requiem"

...to miss the march of this retreating world into vain citadels that are not walled...

---

David and I were joined by Tommy (notdefined) tonight for a performance of Benjamin Britten's WAR REQUIEM by the San Francisco Choral Society and California Chamber Symphony. The piece is very beautiful - and despite a chorus that sang like the peanuts choir most of the time (wah wah wah Christi wah wah Graci wah wah wah) it was quite wonderful. The three soloists, particularly the tenor - were precise and wonderful. The baritone, having his score memorized, was a bit more theatrical than the others - but it was a great performance by each of them. The piece stages different Wilfred Owens poems sung by two soldiers, one British, One German with a "russian" soprano - joined by a children's chorus and nearly 300 member chorus that sings the words to a traditional mass for the dead.

The performance in Davies Symphony Hall was very touching and powerfully beautiful - full of Britten's trademark dissonances and musical contradictions. I loved it. David, being a bit jetlagged - was nodding on and off... but enjoyed it. I will now have to go listen to the recording of the SFS doing this show with Tommy in the choir.

The text chosen by Britten is simply beautiful - and closes with this poem of Owen's entitled "Strange Friends" in which two men meet in heaven - one having killed the other only to be killed moments later and arriving at the after life a day apart. (In Britten's version - heaven - in Owen's version hell)

It seemed that out of battle I escaped
Down some profound dull tunnel, long since scooped
Through granites which titanic wars had groined.

Yet also there encumbered sleepers groaned,
Too fast in thought or death to be bestirred.
Then ,as I probed them, one sprang up, and stared
With piteous recognition in fixed eyes,
Lifting distressful hands, as if to bless.
And by his smile, I knew that sullen hall, -
By his dead smile I knew we stood in Hell.

With a thousand pains that vision's face was grained;
Yet no blood reached there from the upper ground,
And no guns thumped, or down the flues made moan.
'Strange friend,' I said, 'here is no cause to mourn.'
'None,' said that other, 'save the undone years,
The hopelessness. Whatever hope is yours,
Was my life also; I went hunting wild
After the wildest beauty in the world,
Which lies not calm in eyes, or braided hair,
But mocks the steady running of the hour,
And if it grieves, grieves richlier than here.
For by my glee might many men have laughed,
And of my weeping something had been left,
Which must die now. I mean the truth untold,
The pity of war, the pity war distilled.
Now men will go content with what we spoiled,
Or, discontent, boil bloody, and be spilled.
They will be swift with swiftness of the tigress.
None will break ranks, though nations trek from progress.
Courage was mine, and I had mystery,
Wisdom was mine, and I had mastery:
To miss the march of this retreating world
Into vain citadels that are not walled.
Then, when much blood had clogged their chariot-wheels,
I would go up and wash them from sweet wells,
Even with truths that lie too deep for taint.
I would have poured my spirit without stint
But not through wounds; not on the cess of war.
Foreheads of men have bled where no wounds were.

I am the enemy you killed, my friend.
I knew you in this dark: for so you frowned
Yesterday through me as you jabbed and killed.
I parried; but my hands were loath and cold.
Let us sleep now...'