ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the two requiem settings by Gabriel Faure and Antonin Dvorak that represent the comforting and the representational function, explores emotion and on identity that a requiem can provide. It reveals how emotional support and comfort may be provided for a grieving family, and presents how a requiem may be used to unfold an aesthetic discourse, contributing to the development of the audience's identity in the face of death. The emotional impact of Faure's piece is based on a highly intellectual compositional strategy. Faure wrote his requiem for liturgical use, even though today it is most often performed in a concert situation. Its main function is to address the family and close friends of someone who recently died and who are in need of comfort and consolation. Antonin Dvorak wrote his requiem for the concert hall; his target audience is not a grieving congregation in a church.
