A German Requiem (Brahms) A German Requiem (Brahms) A German Requiem, to Words of the Holy Scriptures, Op. 45 () by Johannes Brahms, is a large-scale work for chorus, orchestra, a soprano and a baritone soloist, composed between 1865 and 1868. It comprises seven movements, which together last 65 to 80 minutes, making this work Brahms's longest composition. "A German Requiem" is sacred but non-liturgical, and unlike a long tradition of the Latin "Requiem", "A German Requiem", as its title states, is a "Requiem" in the German language. Brahms's mother died in February 1865, a loss that caused him much grief and may well
A German Requiem (Brahms) at the Bremen Cathedral, that he would have gladly called the work ""Ein menschliches Requiem"" (A human Requiem). Although the Requiem Mass in the Roman Catholic liturgy begins with prayers for the dead ("Grant them eternal rest, O Lord"), "A German Requiem" focuses on the living, beginning with the text "Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted." from the Beatitudes. This theme—transition from anxiety to comfort—recurs in all the following movements except movements IV and VII, the central one and the final one. Although the idea of the Lord is the source of the comfort, the sympathetic