When the Church chooses to renew its historic position as a patron of the arts by commissioning new sacred music for the liturgy, a composer’s task changes. Unlike works purely for the concert stage, music for liturgy is not (or should not be) primarily a vehicle for the composer to project some “originality” of artistic vision. The composer’s task is music that serves to deepen participation in the Holy Mass through inner illumination of the texts.
In composing the Requiem for the Forgotten and the Messe des Malades, my task was to link the liturgical music to the subjects reflected in the titles of these works: the homeless, the refugee, the sick; people that, too often, we would rather not think about. The gestation period was long as I was forced to reflect on core questions. How are we linked to our fellow suffering humans? Just what is our relationship to the unhoused person, to the refugee escaping war or political oppression, to those suffering illness?
