Requiem for Animals

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This work will be available for purchase after May 2025.

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Requiem for Animals for SATB Choir and String Orchestra was commissioned by the Brattleboro Music Center (for performance by the Brattleboro Concert Choir, Jonathan Harvey, director) with additional support from the Culture and Animals Foundation and the Eric Stokes Fund, Earth’s Best in Tune.  I began composing the work in February 2024 and completed it in late October of the same year.  The idea to write a “Requiem for Animals” came in fall 2022 when I heard a story on NPR about a recent study which found that wildlife populations have declined by an average of 69% over the past 50 years, primarily driven by human actions contributing to climate change, including how we produce food, what we eat, and how much food we waste.  This huge decline struck me very hard emotionally, especially as I realized that our system of food production takes a nearly unfathomable amount of animal lives as well.  In essence, as a society we are killing billions of domesticated animals, which is then leading to the deaths of billions of wild animals.

This amount of suffering is so immense, yet many people aren’t even aware of it.  As a composer, the idea naturally came to me of expressing and conveying the magnitude of this suffering through music so that more people could be aware of and reconsider how we collectively treat and interact with all animals beyond just our pets.  Many composers have created requiems to commemorate the dead and lament the loss of life, but these have always been for human life.  I thought it was certainly time that animals were memorialized in a requiem as well.

This requiem combines texts from the traditional Latin requiem mass with texts from various sources and authors (the Bible, J. Howard Moore, Upton Sinclair, Ella Wheeler Wilcox, as well as some original texts of my own) that deal with how humans treat and interact with animals.  The opening Introit (All Beings Are Ends) highlights the commonalities between animals and humans, as we are, after all, animals too.  In the Kyrie (600,000), the choir sings a running estimated tally of how many land animals have been slaughtered for food worldwide since the movement began (based on Faunalytics estimate of 73,162,794,213 land animals slaughtered in 2020 https://faunalytics.org/fundamentals-farmed-animals/.  This comes out to about 23,200 every ten seconds.  I used a more conservative realization of this rate where the choir adds 20,000 to their tally roughly every ten seconds.)  The longest and most intense movement of the requiem, the Sequence (Dies Irae) explores how we have mistreated animals and the consequences of doing so.  It includes an extended scene from Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, set inside a slaughterhouse, at its heart.  The following Agnus Dei (Lambs of God) takes the metaphor of Christ as a sacrificial lamb and extends it to the myriad literal lambs that are killed each day, asking what is the meaning of their sacrifice.  The Lux Aeterna (Those Who Are Gone Forever) asks for eternal light to shine upon our extinct wildlife species, listing thirty-two which have gone extinct primarily due to the impact of human activities.  The Libera Me (Which Shall It Be?) asks us, as the undeniable “masters of the earth,” what kind of relationship will we have with the world and its creatures.  We have the power to choose: we can continue to dominate and exploit it, or we can be its caring and benevolent stewards.  The final movement, In Paradisum (The Voice of the Voiceless) answers this question, proclaiming that we will speak for and protect all the world’s creatures and that this may lead us all, one day, into paradise.

Premiere scheduled for May 17, 2025 at Potash Hill, Marlboro, VT, by the Brattleboro Concert Choir, Jonathan Harvey-director.

Text

(All non-attributed English texts are by the composer)

I.   Introit (All Beings Are Ends)

Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine:
et lux perpetua luceat eis.

All beings are ends; no creatures are means.
All beings have not equal rights, but all have rights.
Non-human beings were not made for human beings
any more than human beings were made for non-human beings.
(Adapted from J. Howard Moore, The Universal Kinship, 1906)

Exaudi orationem meam.

The billions that dwell in the seas, the fields, and the atmospheres of earth
are beings with substantially the same origin, the same natures, the same structures,
the same occupations, and the same general rights to life and happiness, as we ourselves.
(Adapted from J. Howard Moore, The Universal Kinship, 1906)

I am an animal; you are one too.
I share this earth, my home, with you.
Each playing a vital part in the biosphere,
We all wish to live without fear.
My greatest ambition is one you share:
To provide my kin with love and care.
What makes one a human, the other a beast?
Perhaps it’s the capacity to protect or destroy
Those whose power is the least.

II.    Kyrie (600,000)

Kyrie eleison.
Christe eleison.
Kyrie eleison.

Twenty thousand
Forty thousand
Sixty thousand
Eighty thousand
One hundred thousand
One hundred twenty thousand
One hundred forty thousand
One hundred sixty thousand
One hundred eighty thousand
Two hundred thousand
Two hundred twenty thousand
Two hundred forty thousand
Two hundred sixty thousand
Two hundred eighty thousand
Three hundred thousand
Three hundred twenty thousand
Three hundred forty thousand
Three hundred sixty thousand
Three hundred eighty thousand
Four hundred thousand
Four hundred twenty thousand
Four hundred forty thousand
Four hundred sixty thousand
Four hundred eighty thousand
Five hundred thousand
Five hundred twenty thousand
Five hundred forty thousand
Five hundred sixty thousand
Five hundred eighty thousand 

Since this movement began, more than six hundred thousand land animals have been slaughtered for food worldwide.

(Numbers based on Faunalytics estimate of 73,162,794,213 land animals slaughtered in 2020 https://faunalytics.org/fundamentals-farmed-animals/)

III.   Sequence (Dies Irae)

1. Dies Irae (All Have One Breath)

One who slaughters an ox is like one who kills a person;
One who sacrifices a lamb like one who breaks a dog’s neck.
For what happens to animals happens to humans.
As one dies, so dies the other, for they all have one breath.
(Adapted from Isaiah 66:3 and Ecclesiastes 3:19-20)

Dies irae, dies illa,
Solvet saeclum in favilla.

Flooding,
Wildfires,
Deforestation,
Global pandemics,
Ocean dead zones,
Mass extinctions,
Ecosystem collapse.

2. Ingemisco (For I Was Hungry)

Ingemisco, tamquam reus:
Culpa rubet vultus meus:
Supplicanti parce, Deus.

For I was hungry, and you gave me no food;
I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink;
I was a stranger and you did not take me in. 

Lord, when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger
and did not help you? 

Truly I tell you, because you did not do it for the least of them,
you did not do it to me.
(Adapted from Matthew 25: 42-45)

3. Oro Supplex (The Slaughterhouse)

Oro supplex et acclinis,
Cor contritum quasi cinis:
Gere curam mei finis.

The men were going about their work.
As the wheel turned, a hog was suddenly jerked off his feet and borne aloft.
At the same instant the car was assailed by a most terrifying shriek.
The uproar was appalling, perilous to the eardrums;
one feared there was too much sound for the room to hold—
that the walls must give way or the ceiling crack.
There were high squeals and low squeals,
grunts, and wails of agony surging up to a deafening climax.
One by one they hooked up the hogs,
and one by one with a swift stroke they slit their throats. 

It was porkmaking by machinery, porkmaking by applied mathematics,
and yet one could not help thinking of the hogs;
they were so innocent, they came so very trustingly;
and they were so very human in their protests.
They had done nothing to deserve it,
but this slaughtering machine ran on. 

One could not watch very long without hearing the hog squeal of the universe.

Each one was a separate creature with an individuality of his own,
a will of his own, a hope, a heart’s desire, and a sense of dignity.
Trusting and strong in faith he had gone about his business,
while a horrid Fate waited in his pathway and did its cruel will with him,
as if his wishes, his feelings, had simply no existence at all.
And now was one to believe that there was nowhere a god of hogs,
to whom these hog squeals and agonies had a meaning?
Who would take this hog into his arms and comfort him?
(Adapted from Upton Sinclair, The Jungle, 1906)

 4. Lacrimosa (Oh This Poor World)

Lacrimosa dies illa,
Qua resurget ex favila
Judicandus homo reus:
Huic ergo parce Deus.

Oh this poor world
this poor, suffering, ignorant, fear-filled world!
How can we be blind and cold enough
to be unmoved by the groans and anguish, the writhing and tears,
that come up from its unparalleled afflictions?
(Adapted from J. Howard Moore, The Universal Kinship, 1906)

IV.   Agnus Dei (Lambs of God)

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi:
dona eis requiem.

Lamb of God, who died for our sins,
how many more lambs must die for us?
Lamb of God, who died for us all,
are they not all dear Lambs of God?

O Lambs of God, may your sacrifice
Open our eyes and our hearts.
When will we, with the lions and wolves,
Finally lie down with you?

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi:
dona eis requiem sempiternam.

V.   Lux Aeterna (Those Who Are Gone Forever)

Lux æterna luceat eis, Domine:
Cum Sanctis tuis in æternum:
quia pius es.
Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine:
et lux perpetua luceat eis.

Those who are gone forever, we remember you:

The Syrian Elephant
Richdale’s Penguin
The Chatham Duck
Steller’s Sea Cow
The Bluebuck
The White Swamphen
The Spectacled Comorant
The Great Auk
The Tasmanian Emu
The Cape Warthog
The Quagga
The Eastern Hare-Wallaby
The Hokkaido Wolf
The Portuguese Ibex
The Sea Mink
The Norfolk Pigeon
The Carolina Parakeet
The Florida Black WolfThe Thylacine
Tobias’ Caddisfly
Schomburgk’s Deer
The Canary Islands Oystercatcher
The Bali Tiger
The Caribbean Monk Seal
The Pallid Beach Mouse
The Sicilian Wolf
The Saudi Gazelle
The Acorn Pearly Mussel
The Dusky Seaside Sparrow
The Golden Toad
The Chinese Paddlefish
The Western Black Rhinoceros 

Father, forgive us, for we know not what we’ve done.
(Adapted from Luke 23:34)

VI.  Libera Me (Which Shall It Be?)

The question is not, “Shall humans be the masters of the earth?”
But, “What sort of masters shall we be?”
(Adapted from J. Howard Moore, The New Ethics, 1907)

Libera me, Domine, de morte æterna.

Shall we be cruel and selfish, bigoted and imperialistic, thinking only of ourselves
and sacrificing the interests of others to our own heartless purposes?
(Adapted from J. Howard Moore, The New Ethics, 1907)

Tremens factus sum ego,
et timeo, dum discussio venerit,
atque ventura ira.

Or shall we be the responsible administrators of the universe, presiding over the affairs of the
earth honourably and equitably, with a mind single to the good of all?
(Adapted from J. Howard Moore, The New Ethics, 1907)

Requiem æternam dona eis, Domine:
et lux perpetua luceat eis.

Which shall it be—the savage law of might or the great law of love?
(Adapted from J. Howard Moore, The New Ethics, 1907)

VII.  In Paradisum (The Voice of the Voiceless)

I am the voice of the voiceless;
   Through me the dumb shall speak;
Till the deaf world’s ear be made to hear
   The cry of the wordless weak.
              (from “The Voice of the Voiceless” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Poems of Experience, 1917)

In paradisum deducant te Angeli:
in tuo adventu suscipiant te Martyres,
et perducant te in civitatem sanctam Jerusalem.
Chorus Angelorum te suscipiat,
et cum Lazaro quondam paupere
æternam habeas requiem.

The same Force formed the sparrow
   That fashioned man, the king;
The God of the Whole gave a spark of soul
   To furred and to feathered thing.
And I am my brother’s keeper,
   And I will fight his fight,
And speak the word for beast and bird,
   Till the world shall set things right.
(from “The Voice of the Voiceless” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, Poems of Experience, 1917)

Requiem aeternam.