Since its first complete performance in 1868 in the Cathedral of Bremen, Brahms's Ein deutsches Requiem is, without question, one of the key works in the history of the choral canon. The reputation of the work is based not only on its unusually concentrated musical structure, but also on the original conception of the text: Brahms assembled important passages from both the Old and New Testaments in Luther's translation so that thoughts on sorrow and consolation would clearly refer to one another. In contrast to many other choral works of the 19th century Brahms places the choir, the voice of the community, in the centre of this interdenominational celebration of the dead.
