Ralph Vaughan Williams: Dona Nobis Pacem (Complete)

[@DonVila]

This is a beautiful version. In 1973 the combined chorales and choir of Evanston Twp High School learned (over some months) and performed it with our Concert Orchestra. One of the performances was for a convention of some sort at Chicago's Palmer House Hotel. We finished the piece, totally wrung out, to be greeted with silence. You can imagine our reactions. Then, thunderous sound as the audience leapt to their feet. A singular experience in my life.

[@chrispeek8412]

I think this song longs for peace. The composer Vaughan Williams was an ambulance attendant during World War I. He saw firsthand carnage & death of war. It affected him and his music thereafter.

[@LiliKoblentz]

Excellent observation! That's almost exactly what he was going for - thus the soprano soloist singing "Dona Nobis Pacem/Give us peace." It's a cry for peace that we dont have.

[@donnaclark603]

We are going to Carnegie to sing this in June, with the director of my choir directing. Wonderful experience and I can't wait! Been once before under the direction of John Rutter. There is nothing like performing in Carnegie Hall.

[@LiliKoblentz]

I love Rutter! He's such a delightful man. I got to be part of the children's choir when Carnegie debuted his Mass of the Children, and then once again (as an adult) recently for his Gloria!

[@johnphillips5993]

We just did Dona nobis pacem this year. It’s an unbelievable work

[@elainaveasey5831]

My high school choir is traveling to Carnegie Hall this spring to perform this song, so its nice to actually hear a choir of this size performing it

[@pizzicatoman]

This is glorious music emphasising devastatingly powerful words. It should be compulsory study and performance for every student of music worldwide! The tragedies of the human condition are nowhere more intensely exposed and underlined in a musical language which is at once intensely personal and overwhelmingly universal.

[@tiffanyvantine3322]

I sang this at Saddleback College, CA several years ago. I’ve recently been reading “Leaves of Grass” and my brain perked up at Beat Beat Drums and Dirge for Two Veterans saying, “You’ve sung this…but what is it?!” Google, google, google…ah! That’s it. Oh yeah, I remember how devilishly hard this was! But so rewarding. And this is a lovely performance.

[@merimcginnis439]

I'm performing this in the spring at Carnegie hall!!! With my varsity choir beyond excited

[@drebinmeme912]

Me and my high school choir (Taylor High School Senior Choir), Lakota West High school choir, and the May festival youth choirs just preformed this this weekend, along with the Cincinnati Symphony Youth Orchestra, for a benefit concert held at the Collage of Mount St. Joesph, one of the most powerful works I have ever had the honor to do.

[@almalopes6616]

I’m j

[@somnitel]

Beautifully done! Somewhere V-W is smiling.

[@drebinmeme912]

And the same goes to you! It was awesome to be able to sing with you guys playing!

[@dijaebradley]

We are performing this entire piece in my high school choir. We're from Niagara Falls , New York !

[@Wotansangst]

A great performance of a great work. (And that beautiful theater brings back memories of watching the RPO under David Zinman years ago). UR '76

[@amschmidlkofer]

UWEC Choral Union performing this tomorrow. Very excited

[@MuscleMikal]

LSU 1983 Wonderful memories!

[@lesleyfarmer7216]

played this last night in maccesfield Cheshire KEMS music society

[@hobie1dog]

If you're prone to coughing, why don't you take a lozenger before you get in the concert hall?

[@carmenperalesgarrido3695]

Es maravilloso. .No habrá alguna versión subtitulada?

[@mujerado]

Good performance. The overall tempi are very fast, it should be more measured, and the quiet sections lingered over for the full weight of the text to register. The chorus is excellent, and the soloists very good. As frequently happens with this piece, the orchestra plays too loudly. It's all very grand and glorious, but some of Vaughan Williams's contrapuntal lines go muddy when the hall is this vibrant and the forces aren't balanced more judiciously. Good, but not great.

[@davidvolk8965]

Agreed. Beautiful sound overall ... but why the hurry on the tempi?

[@Randysax1955]

Maybe it's the sound man...and not the orchestra at all. Easy to criticize from the armchair

[@Shadowfax-1980]

The tempo seems to be in line with many of the recordings of the piece

[@johnalexander6867]

Wonderful music, very well performed. Pity that the orchestra drowns the choir in the Beat Beat Drums section

[@saweke9735]

What year was this performance? We sang this in Carnegie in 2002. I wish I had a recording of it.

[@brasstail]

When you lookin for the Dona nobis pacem your choir did and you can't find it at all ugh

[@musicalnerds101]

3:40

[@kevinjohnson8311]

Beautiful sounds, but balance needs to be addressed. Consider using a digital organ if an actual instrument is not available.

[@musicalnerds101]

33:35

[@siegfriedkircheis9484]

savage