Robb Requiem Featured in Santa Fe Concert

MAY 23, 2013

A newly orchestrated version of John Donald Robb’s Requiem was performed in a May 23 Santa Fe concert presented by the New Mexico Performing Arts Society. The rarely performed St. Cecilia Mass by Charles Gounod also was on the program at St. Francis Auditorium in the New Mexico Museum of Art.

Both performances were conducted by Franz Vote, a founding member of the NMPAS who has been called one of the finest conductors of his era. He spent the 1990s as a conductor with the Metropolitan Opera, and throughout his career has collaborated with many of the top names in opera. Both compositions were performed by the New Mexico Bach Society, featuring a professional orchestra, choir and top-tier soloists. 

Maxine Thevenot, organist and choral director at St. John’s Episcopal Cathedral in Albuquerque, played the nearly 100-year-old McNary pipe organ, which was donated to the museum in the 1930s. She is also a lecturer at the University of New Mexico.  Featured vocal soloists included Edmund Connolly, Andre Garcia-Nuthmann, Sarah Ihlefeld, Carol Leitner, Lina Ramos, Kathlene Ritch and Tim Willson.

The Requiem was completed in 1985 when Robb, former dean of the UNM College of Fine Arts and a prolific composer, was 93. It was his last major composition and was written, “In Memory of Mother, Father, and Eight Brothers & Sisters”. It originally had been scored for a large orchestra and chorus, but for the Santa Fe concert has been re-scored for a smaller orchestra.
The concert included a French connection: Robb was greatly influenced by Nadia Boulanger, a French composer, conductor and teacher who taught many of the leading composers of the 20th Century, including Robb. Gounod, a Frenchman, completed the highly acclaimed St. Cecilia Mass in 1854, when he was 36. The piece established him as a noteworthy composer.

The UNM John Donald Robb Trust contributed partial underwriting to the Santa Fe concert. Support also came from Friends of The New Mexico Performing Arts Society, the Santa Fe Symphony and Richard Kurman.
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Linda Marianiello discusses the Requiem with Spencer Beckwith on KUNM, 89.9FM
Albuquerque Journal article highlights Santa Fe concert