Description
Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings stands among the most profoundly moving works in the orchestral repertoire. In 1967, the composer himself arranged this iconic piece for mixed choir, setting it to the Latin text of the Agnus Dei from the Catholic Mass.
What emerges is something transformed yet equally devastating. The human voice, with all its vulnerability and warmth, carries Barber's long-breathed melodic lines into new emotional territory. The text itself—a prayer for mercy and peace—finds its perfect musical expression in these slowly unfolding harmonies that build toward an almost unbearable climax before dissolving into silence.
This performance captures the essence of what makes the choral version so uniquely powerful: the way young voices navigate the work's extreme dynamic range, from the most delicate pianissimo to the shattering fortissimo at its peak. There is an intimacy here that the orchestral version, for all its grandeur, cannot quite achieve.
Few works in the entire choral literature demand such sustained intensity from performers, and fewer still reward that commitment so completely.
Recording set: Jože Plečnik's unconventional design for the Church of St. Francis (Cerkev sv. Frančiška), constructed between 1925 and 1927, is derived from his plans for the Church of the Sacred Heart in Prague, built in 1922. The central part of the church is covered with a gently sloping roof topped with a belfry added in 1931. The belfry has a distinctive shape dominated by two rows of pillars in its upper two storeys and a conic roof sloping up steeply. The main entrance is enhanced by a monumental colonnade with an open tympanum. The inside of the church is unusual. Its central space is framed by a row of monumental brick columns, on the outer side of which, next to the walls, there is enough space to walk all around the central part of the church. The main altar is positioned right next to the colonnade, at a distance from the church wall behind it. It is flanked by side altars, which are also positioned next to the rows of columns. Later, when the church was already in use, Plečnik occasionally added new elements to it. He furnished it with chandeliers and, after World War II, decorated the church's Chapel of Our Lady of Sorrow, baptistery and sacristy.
Production: TAJUS and PPZ
Production assistants: Dan Ažman, Gal Nagode, Jakob Zevnik
Light design: Gal Nagode
Crane operator: Matej Zagorc
Dolly grip: Gal Nagode
Production lead and director of photography: Juš Hrastnik
Sound: Kloptec produkcija
Balance engineer: Iztok Zupan
Mastering: Iztok Zupan
Script: Primož Zevnik
Assistant director and executive producer: Juš Hrastnik
Editor and director: Primož Zevnik
© TAJUS & PPZ produkcija. All rights reserved.