Choir 'Day of Wrath, Day of Mourning'
Doesn't the choir tune sound very similar to the music played at the beginning of "The Shining"? Can anyone verify if there's a meaningful connection?
shareThe reason for the similarity is that both songs were derived from the same melody: that is the 'dies irie', which is the medieval hymn for the dead. If you want more info on the actual notes, just google it. I'm sure it will turn up.
sharewow, that's pretty cool.
shareit's "dies irae".
shareBut, which version of "Dies irae" is it? The one from Mozart or the one from Verdi?
sharesorry for the mispelling. Both Mozart's and Verdi's versions are not official, they are simply variations of the chant, as is the hymn in DoW.
shareLet's be clear about this: "Dies irae" is a hymn that comes down to us from medieval times. That hymn, normally inserted into the liturgy for the Requiem Mass, is used, with some variation (and modern harmonization), in this movie. Mozart and Verdi (and many others who wrote their own Requiems from scratch) wrote completely new music for the ancient words in their respective Requiems. But you can also hear the original music in many pieces of classical music (Rachmaninoff used it at least three times, most tellingly at the end of the Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini). Interestingly, there is a Danish composer, Vagn Holmboe, who was also attracted to the tune, and quoted it in his Symphony No. 10 (1970). Did he get the idea from the Dreyer movie? Betcha.
shareEven Andrew Lloyd Webber wrote a Requiem piece, which includes the Dies Irae. I used to have a recording of it with Placido Domingo and Sarah Brightman.
share