A serious young man, torn by the death of his mother and the loss of a mentor, not a believer but finding comfort in the spiritual… This is the Brahms who wrote A German Requiem – a magnificent, heartful work for soloists, chorus and orchestra.

This isn’t a Latin requiem for the church, and you can forget the fire and brimstone of the ‘day of wrath’. Brahms turned his back on judgement and drama to choose words from Luther’s German bible, creating a text that, as the soprano sings at the end, ‘will comfort you as one whom his own mother comforts’.

A German Requiem speaks of consolation, its music is rich with emotion. It is, as Brahms wrote, ‘a human requiem’. And in 2025,we present an expansive and heartfelt interpretation with the Festival Chorus and special guests, the Sydney Youth Orchestra.