Ed Zubrow wrote:

>At its core Britten's War Requiem is not about any of this.  It is a
>pacifist's cry of anger and disbelief.  It is dripping with irony.  It is
>truly a modern piece and, as such, provides neither redemption nor comfort.

Thank heavens you got that part!  A Dallas music critic wrote a disgusting
review of Richard Hickox performance here a few years ago, criticising
this very concept as the major shortcoming of the work.

>We settle in to a traditional beginning, including a prayer of praise
>from a boys' choir.  But this is soon interrupted by the first line of
>the first of Wilfred Owen's poems.  Without accompaniment, the tenor sings
>a discordant, wailing question: "What passing bells for these who die as
>cattle?" The last word is fairly spit out.  Thus, the stage is set: this
>Mass will be operatic, but it will be as different from Donizetti as Billy
>Budd is from The Elixer of Love.  the plot is about nothing less than
>conflict between God and man.  And it confronts the weakness of God.

Whoa!  I don't think so at all.  The conflict here is between the mercy
and the barbarism of man himself.  Owen's poems do not criticize God at
all, rather, they are a scathing commentary on the willingness of an older
generation to sacrifice their children in order to maintain, amongst other
things, wealth and power.  I do not see any weakness on the part of a deity
here, nor any attention called by poet or composer to same.

>For the rest of the work the chorus will represent conventionality:
>conventional thought, conventional people and established institutions.
>Its music is beautiful, but at each turn it is interrupted, commented on,
>and mocked by the soloists.  I think in a way the chorus plays the same
>role that the townspeople do in Peter Grimes or that Captain Vere (Captain
>Truth?) plays in Billy Budd.

I agree with this.

>In short, the establishment is trapped.  Trapped by its assumptions and its
>rituals.  Unable to see the humanity in the "other"--whether Grimes, Billy
>or the Germans.  So too in the mass: words of consolation but, in the end,
>no help or solace for the dead soldiers who, after all, are victims not of
>an existential mystery but of man's folly.

I think you have missed something here too.  I think that Britten's
and Owen's main critique is not of the Germans, but of the English
themselves who allowed their sons to be slaughtered in what was in many
ways a completely pointless conflict.  The Germans were the aggressors
here, but the English were faulted by doing too little to solve the
conflict peacefully.

>Structurally, the Offertorium occurring near the middle of the drama
>provdes the turning point for the plot.  God is asked to fulfill his
>promise to spare Abraham's son Isaac despite Abraham's willingness to
>sacrifice him.  In the War Requiem, Britten has his tenor and baritone tell
>the story of Abraham on the mountain in a remarkable duet.  With the youth
>bound and the old man Abraham lifting his knife, an angel calls out to him
>from heaven, telling him to spare the youth and sacrifce a ram caught in a
>nearby thicket instead.  Presumably God is willing.  But He is unable.

In the biblical story, Abraham, not God is being put to the test.  God
promised nothing to Abraham, rather he granted him mercy when he proved
obedient.  The comment made by the Abraham and Isaac story is that God once
again offers mercy upon Abraham (metaphorically, the British Government)
and it is they that disobey God by slaying the seed of Europe one by one.

>They close the duet:
>
> "But the old man would not do so, but slew his son,-- And half the
> seed of Europe one by one."

This is not, I repeat NOT, a critique of God.  The old man is "Abraham" who
represents the English leaders.  (And the other involved governments for
that matter>)

>...  We now know that consolation will not be found in the words
>of the Mass; the Lord's weakness has been exposed.  The soprano pleads one
>more time, but from here on the bass and tenor, representing a German and
>an English soldier, take over the action.  They are on their own now, and
>we watch to see how their drama will be resolved.

I don't know where you got this notion that Britten was trying to
expose the weakness of God.  In fact, he was exposing the weakness of man
as being unable to solve their differences by any means less than violence.
I have studied this work extensively and have spent hours with all of the
available documentation on Britten and his music, and I am sorry to say
that I think you have the whole idea behing this masterpiece wrong.

>I don't have a score, but I would be interested to know the harmony of the
>final amen.  I'm pretty certain it is not a standard cadence.

It is a c-f# tritone resolving through a series of chords to an F major
chord.  The signature harmonic motif of the entire piece.

>Apologies for the length of this post.  Recognizing that this is probably
>a pretty unorthodox interpretation of the War Requiem, I wll put on my
>flame-retardant cloak and prepare to be educated by any comments or
>recommedations that come my way.

Well, Ed, I don't think that there is anything wrong with your post's
length, but I think that you have missed the boat on the interpretation
of Britten's text settings.  May I suggest that you read the chapter on the
War Requiem in Peter Evans' excellent book "The Music of Benjamin Britten,"
and then you might rethink your interpretation!

Kevin Sutton