Dvořák: Requiem by Dvořák, De (2017/2017), Director musical Jakub Hrůša, Rudolfinum, Prague, Czech Republic

Dvořák’s Requiem had its world premiere in 1891 at the music festival in Birmingham, England, which had commissioned him to write a work ‘of first importance’. When composing it Dvořák was at the height of his creative powers, and he decided to express in this work the prowess and world view he had achieved during the fifty years of his life both as a composer and as a human being: he 'speaks' of his relation to God and seeks answers to the most fundamental questions of human existence, but without spectacle, exaggerated pathos, or weepiness. On this evening the work will sound in a rendition by world-renowned soloists Ailyn Pérez, Christianne Stotijn, Michael Spyres, and Jan Martínek with the Prague Philharmonic Choir and the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra.