War Requiem

“I am the enemy you killed, my friend,” wrote an English lieutenant on the northern French front in 1918. On Armistice Day, Wilfred Owen dies at the age of 25. Death knell and ringing of peace overlap — their echo echoes in Benjamin Britten's War Requiem: an anti-militarist, anti-nationalist monument of remembrance, collective grief and personal loss. Marked by the violence of two world wars, the work was premiered in 1962 to celebrate the reconstruction of Coventry Cathedral. Just as the ruin is integrated into the new architecture, Owen's poems also break through the process of the Latin Mass for the Dead. Britten's setting draws on the emotional force of the requiem tradition and brings in the knowledge of human nature that distinguishes him as an opera composer. War Requiem stands for pacifism as an artistic stance and has unfortunately not lost its significance in our current political situation. The internationally acclaimed production from London — created there to commemorate the end of World War I in 2018 — which is being rehearsed by the artistic team led by director Daniel Kramer and photographer Wolfgang Tillmans at the invitation of the Deutsche Oper Berlin also stands up for peace. The production combines Kramer's poetically powerful bodywork with the unconventional, world-oriented view of star photographer Tillmans, who is making his opera debut in Berlin. Both create timeless situations in which trauma and comfort, mass and intimacy reside. Photographic snapshots crown the room, seem to be observing for themselves, curdling into silent landscapes. As a sign of artistic encounter, the solo parts at the premiere were to be sung by a Russian soprano, a British tenor and a German baritone. At the last moment, the Soviet government prevented its star soprano from participating. Now this symbolic cast is supposed to be under...

Was Requiem op. 66 text based on the Missa pro Defunctis and poems by Wilfried Owen premiered on May 30, 1962 at Coventry Cathedral Premiere at the English National Opera on November 16, 2018 Premiere at the Deutsche Oper Berlin on June 18, 2027