Life & Work

St Paul’s choir to perform Mozart’s classical piece

choir

St. Paul‘s Chapel Community Choir Nairobi at a past performance. PHOTO | BILL ODIDI

St. Paul’s University Chapel Choir will perform one of the best loved choral pieces in classical music during two concerts this weekend at the Strathmore University Auditorium.

The choir, accompanied by the Kenya National Youth Orchestra, will perform Wolfgang Mozart’s “Requiem Mass in D Minor.”

The concert is organised to raise funds for the Beatification Process of Maurice Michael Cardinal Otunga, particularly the printing of the official biography, known as the “Positio”, whose publication will take place in Rome.

The final draft of this biography will soon be complete and once done, at least 60 copies of the book will be published and submitted to the Cardinal and Bishops who sit on the Congregation of Causes of Saints.

This is the group in Rome that is overseeing the canonization process for the first Kenyan Cardinal.

Otunga, who resigned as Archbishop of Nairobi in 1997 due to illness and died in 2003, is now called Servant of God. If his life as captured in the biography satisfies the Church hierarchy of his heroic virtues then he will he will become “Venerable.”

For the beatification to take place, it must be proven beyond doubt that an extraordinary miracle benefitted someone through the intercession of Cardinal Otunga.

Bro. Reginald Cruz, who is charge of the beatification process in Kenya explains, that the publication of the extensive volumes of the biography is an expensive affair and so the Catholic Archdiocese of Nairobi has organised this concert as a major fundraiser to meet the costs of this crucial stage of process.

“For this concert, we selected not just a classical piece but a sacred composition of music, which is also a prayer for the eternal repose of the soul,” explains Bro Cruz who teaches Church History at Tangaza University, School of Theology.

The Requiem was commissioned in 1791 by a German aristocrat to commemorate the anniversary of the death of his wife, but in a tragic twist, Mozart himself died before completing the music.

The composer’s wife Constanze then arranged for another composer Franz Xaver Sussmayr to complete the work a year later and it was actually also performed at a memorial for Mozart.

Bro Cruz who sings a tenor says the “Requiem” is one of the most challenging pieces in Mozart’s repertoire. “My first experience performing this piece was with a choir in Boston in the U.S when we had to rehearse for 5 months to get ready for the show.”

Emotions

Levi Wataka, Music Director with the Kenya National Youth Orchestra, who will conduct the performance of the “Requiem” says the piece is not challenging at a technical level, but rather the interpretation of the message.

“Nothing beats this music composition for the intensity of the emotions associated with it and therein lies the challenge of the performance,” says Wataka.

The conductor says that while the Youth orchestra has performed the piece before, the younger musicians who have joined in the last few years are playing the “Requiem” for the first time.

So they have invited some members of other ensembles like the Kenya Conservatoire Orchestra and Nairobi Music Orchestra to play with them during the two performances.

“As the conductor, my work is to ensure that the orchestra plays its role as a support to the choir and that the voices of the singers are allowed to flourish.” The St Paul’s Choir, whose motto is “Singing for the voiceless”, has been rehearsing three times a week throughout May for the concert, led by Music Director Dan Odhiambo.

Ensembles

The last time the St Paul’s Chapel Choir performed this piece was in Easter 2013 during which the choir was conducted by Indian music maestro Professor Vijay Upadhyaya, founder of the India Youth Orchestra and head of music at the Vienna University.

“We have two excellent ensembles, the choir and the orchestra and they have been highly professional and very generous with their time,” says Bro. Cruz.

“I am sure that this is the same group that will perform the music when we finally get to the last stage of the Beatification,” he says.

Wataka says this weekend’s concert will be one befitting the respect that Cardinal Otunga personified: “This concert will be a landmark of the beatification process for the Cardinal,” he says.

There will be two performances on Sunday 29th May at 3pm and 6pm at the Strathmore University Auditorium. Tickets will be sold at the door for Sh2,500 or via M-Pesa paybill No. 560701.

All proceeds go towards the Cardinal Otunga Beatification.