Did you ever have the fear of eternal hell, the fear of Judgment Day and eternal flames, that this piece - especially the "Dies Irae" - expresses?

Audiophiles took a real shine to Mannheim Steamroller, both for the superior album packaging and the clean sound (if memory serves, American Gramaphone used to charge on the high side for their LPs). Terry talked with Yannick about how he's dealing with the pandemic and about his history with Verdi's choral masterpiece. And to me, it's the swirls of what will accompany this storm of the last judgment, the swirl of the wind and of all the hurricanes that will take all the judged people to - who knows? But at some point, you know, if there's for whatever reason the concentration and the focus goes, it's better to let it go. The title track "Fresh Aire" is an air, "Saras Band" is a sarabande, and perhaps most cleverly, "Pass the Keg (Lia)" is a passacaglia. - because - ebullient. So this is almost like a baroque way of doing things, like what Bach would have done to create an effect which we call this, which is an immediate emotion or an image emotionally. "Prelude" – 1:33 "Chocolate Fudge" – 2:54 "Interlude … And it might be the greatest values. But for me, the - what - the Judgment Day in that requiem, what it depicts for me is more the fears of the human life on our Earth, that we don't want the Earth to explode in a few decades. Copyright 2020 Fresh Air. GROSS: You're in Montreal as we speak, which is a lot safer than the U.S. is right now in terms of the virus. And for me, the colleagues I have in Philadelphia and in New York are as close to me as the colleagues in Montreal are.

So when you were 15 and still not very experienced in the world, what did this music and the power mean to you? Our guest is Yannick Nezet-Seguin, the music director and conductor of the Metropolitan Opera in New York and the Philadelphia Orchestra.

Yannick conducted the orchestra, soloists and the Westminster Symphonic Choir in a performance of Verdi's "Requiem." This "Lacrymosa" with all those tears and sighs - (vocalizing) - the violins and the alto solos and the sopranos. It's like a two-way expansion of perspective.

So you have the two biggest extremes, and you have really soft and really just booming passages. We lost one member of the viola section in The Met Orchestra, and we lost one assistant conductor who was one of our most wonderful colleagues in the music staff. So he was assigned to do the final movement.

Find album reviews, stream songs, credits and award information for Fresh Aire Interludes - Jackson Berkey on AllMusic - 1981

For that inaugural performance, he conducted Verdi's "Requiem" with the orchestra, four soloists and the Westminster Symphonic Choir. But 26 seconds is actually a really long time.

The "Requiem" is a choral masterpiece featuring the orchestra, four solo performers and a full choir. Les membres Amazon Prime profitent de la livraison accélérée gratuite sur des millions d’articles, d’un accès à des milliers de films et séries sur Prime Video, et de nombreux autres avantages. Composer Chip Davis refers to his music as "18th century rock and roll." (There is some evidence that this theme may have been imposed upon the album after the fact, as the rest of the series progressed, since the liner notes for this album clearly link each of the 12 tracks to the 12 months of the year. I think we should all feel like we're the citizens of the Earth here, of course, even more in my case. - maybe hell or - so that is all part of why also Verdi repeats it very often. DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. So that is actually the anguish because it is almost like a huge sigh or a huge cry. Veuillez réessayer.

But within the final movement, this "Libera Me," the "Dies Irae" text comes back. The album was originally released in 1981. Those are very unique. And you've conducted orchestras - so you have friends around the world. And I was thinking that was really intentional. And the melody itself, which Verdi took also again in his opera "Don Carlos," which is my favorite of Verdi - (singing in non-English language). Well, actually, I was trying to analyze more the elements of what rings true in terms of theater or in terms of religion because, you know, as you and I have talked about a few times already, my own relationship to religion when I was growing was very, very, very strong. NEZET-SEGUIN: Well, Terry, it's a privilege always to talk to you really.

Thinking of Mozart, thinking of Brahms and Verdi - maybe those three, maybe even above all the others - or Faure as well, Gabriel Faure. For more than 40 years, Fresh Air with Terry Gross has inspired and engaged audiences, both in the Greater Philadelphia area where it began as a local program on WHYY-FM in 1975 and across the country as a nationally-broadcast show since 1987. Nous utilisons des cookies et des outils similaires pour faciliter vos achats, fournir nos services, pour comprendre comment les clients utilisent nos services afin de pouvoir apporter des améliorations, et pour présenter des annonces. SANCTUS"). Terry had the chance to talk with him in July when our station, WHYY-TV, streamed his very first performance as music director of the Philadelphia Orchestra in 2012. And the fact that this is repeated over and over again is also incredible.

And it's such an emotional work. Shop and Buy Mannheim Steamroller - Fresh Aire I sheet music. Usually, what I am doing is that I'm thinking of the performance and trying to sense also and during that time the audience and their energy. The expression of it - or maybe that's now the Yannick, a 45-year-old, talking to you. It's 26 seconds. You know, if they're with us, then it can last as long - you know, it could still be going on. NEZET-SEGUIN: I think when I was - as far as I remember, when I was a teenager, what I was very interested in was from the viewpoint of a music student or scholar. (See all 10 articles) Submissions. Découvrez Fresh Air Interlude [Explicit] de Eazzzy sur Amazon Music. So we did have to already immediately take into account all of these questions. And I think that it's important to do everything, you know, especially as artists, to bring music to the people who are struggling and to give them comfort but also give them hope.

GROSS: Well, am I right in saying that when you were a child - that you sang in the choir, doing Verdi's "Requiem?"

And the recent months have proven it, you know, that even though we try, we try hard with technology and everything to control our destiny, there's something at some point that will be greater than us, and we have to react. It was originally released in 1975.

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He became the third music director of the Metropolitan Opera in 2018 and became the Philadelphia Orchestra's eighth music director in 2012. NEZET-SEGUIN: So, actually, maybe the part as a singer which I found always the most touching and fulfilling is "Lacrymosa."

Coming up, John Powers reviews the new TV series "Tehran" about a female Israeli spy sent undercover to Iran.

From Verdi's "Requiem," this is the "Tuba Mirum" section of the movement called "Dies Irae," which translates to the day of wrath. I just want to say, it's a magnificent performance of Verdi's "Requiem," and it's such a really awe-inspiring piece. So this is why it was the starting point for his own requiem mass many years later.

But this is the day of wrath section, and I want to quote a few of the lines.

Reviewed in the United States on April 3, 2015. Are you counting in your mind? It's all the unknown. Écoutez de la musique en streaming sans publicité ou achetez des CDs et MP3 maintenant sur Amazon.fr. The trumpet scattering a marvelous sound through the tombs of every land will gather all before the throne. And it's also for me important as a leader that I can be there for my institutions and also really be ready to bring the music back live when it's going to be possible. I mean, this is a piece about the dread of eternal damnation versus the possibility of eternal life. When Mannheim Steamroller cuts loose -- as on "Rondo," "Chocolate Fudge," and "Saras Band" -- they're a hoot. Or I'm not saying not at all, but this is not the focus of how I conceived and still conceive religion or faith.

So those descending lines is what we call the chromatic scale. And that's - you know, there's usually, like, time for the notes to decay in the, you know, performing hall and, you know, a bit of silence at the end for reflection. It was your first performance with the Philadelphia Orchestra as its music director. It's all about kinship of humankind to these eternal themes, which religion is one way of explaining in each. Vos articles vus récemment et vos recommandations en vedette. A little bit after - when it quiets down, after a couple of minutes of that - into that movement, it talks about the terror. (SOUNDBITE OF PHILIPPE JORDAN'S "MESSA DA REQUIEM: XIII. Of course, it's not possible at the moment, but we need to be ready when it's becoming possible. Yannick is the young, charismatic music director of both New York's Metropolitan Opera and the Philadelphia Orchestra. But when you conducted this, it was in 2012, and it was a celebratory performance. I'm Dave Davies, in for Terry Gross, back with her interview with conductor Yannick Nezet-Seguin.

GROSS: So I want to talk to you about a specific part of the piece, and it's the "Dies Irae." It's a treat for me to just lay back and let the music drift over me, caressing me with what feels like waves of love masquerading in the sound of falling rain, or a passing storm. After the chorus, there is also an incredible gesture from all the strings. This is such a powerful piece that you probably really wanted time for the audience to just sit with the silence and just reflect on what they heard and what they felt. Composer Chip Davis breaks the album into 12 semi-classical structures (sonatas, interludes, even a disguised passacaglia) that match up to the seasons, rendering Fresh Aire a concept album about nature and life.

YANNICK NEZET-SEGUIN: Well, Terry, as you just said, this is a piece that's very awe-inspiring, but also it's a piece that is very deep and has a lot of content which is not necessarily uplifting, in a way, immediately because, of course, it's the mass for the dead. It is - and that was completely revolutionary in Verdi's time - it is actually six trumpets - two on stage but two on one side of the auditorium and two on the other side. It also analyzes reviews to verify trustworthiness. Après avoir consulté un produit, regardez ici pour revenir simplement sur les pages qui vous intéressent. And, like, my goodness (laughter). But the chorus is most importantly, I think, representing the mob of all of us humans in fear. Instead of having maybe a formalized or true accepted vision of what it is that this text means as a prayer or as a believer of one's faith. DAVIES: If you're just joining us our guest is Yannick Nezet-Seguin the music director and conductor of The Metropolitan Opera in New York and The Philadelphia Orchestra. This is FRESH AIR. And it's that sense of connection that you're talking about. DAVIES: Conductor Yannick Nezet-Seguin talking about Verdi's "Requiem," his very first performance as music director of the Philadelphia Orchestra in 2012.

Are you just feeling it? How can I subscribe or unsubscribe to NPR newsletters? And maybe another fact, which I'm sure you know, but maybe our listeners don't all know - that this piece was first composed as part of a collective requiem for a tribute to Rossini. Composer Chip Davis refers to his music as "18th century rock and roll.".

So that's at the very end of that second movement, you said, which is a sequence, which is very, very long. This is FRESH AIR. At its spaciest, Fresh Aire sounds like Keith Emerson or Camel; when the band's in a medieval mood, Gentle Giant (notably "Talybont") comes to mind. So it is a written echo effect, imagining that the trumpets in the world will come from every part of the planet. And I hope that maybe that's another way to understand this very quintessentially human and not necessarily religious message.