Brahms’ A German Requiem is a work I return to often, and it would seem I am not alone. Despite the disruptions caused by the pandemic, since 2019 it has been performed on at least nine different occasions by major ensembles around the country.

Opera Australia’s Brahms: A German Requiem. Photo © Keith Saunders

When I reviewed Simone Young’s reading in 2022, it marked the return of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra to the Sydney Opera House after the lockdowns, along with Sydney Philharmonia Choirs under Brett Weymark and Elizabeth Scott.

Licking our collective wounds, we were in desperate need of Brahms’ life-affirming music, which Young, Weymark and Scott delivered in spades, with Emma Matthews and Bo Skovhus as the two soloists.

However, just as we found comfort in a humanistic work that eschews references to damnation in favour of a gentler memento mori and solace in the face of grief, the world was being plunged into wars that would lead to the greatest humanitarian crisis since the Second World War – the effects of which are being felt the world over.

And so, four years later, we find ourselves in the hands of conductor...