Daniel, Nick and the other band members had smiles on their faces as they put their hands out in a circle and yelled “band!”
“Thanks, Jason!” Nick said. “You are always so thoughtful, and when you think about it, this whole performance is only possible because of you!”
Daniel came up to Jason, grabbed his hand in a bro shake, and put his other arm around him. “Nick’s right, Jason. This is all possible because of you.” Then looking at Jason’s suit and dress shoes, Daniel added, “Nice threads by the way. Is this the new Jason look?”
“No way, Daniel! But my mom said that she would hide all my pairs of red high tops if I even thought about wearing them tonight!”
* * * * *
By 7:50 most of the orchestra was in place on stage, and at 7:55 the choir began their processional onto the risers in the back of the stage. In the theater people were still finding their seats, so the lights were not dimmed until seven minutes after eight. Then the concertmaster came out and had the oboe player give a tuning note to the wind players and then for the strings. When the tuning was finished, out came Daniel and the Second Chance All Stars, followed by David Molinari. The audience gave them an enthusiastic round of applause. Mr. Molinari then went up to one of the vocal microphones and addressed the audience.
“In all of my years as a conductor and music educator, I have never had the opportunity to be involved in an event like you are about to witness tonight. From one of the most tragic events in our recent history, the kidnapping, abuse, and murder of innocent kids in our community, comes one of the most uplifting and emotional pieces of music that you will ever hear. This Requiem for the Lost Children was actually composed by one of those lost children, but luckily one of the kids who escaped that horrible fate. And I thank God that Nicolo Feraducci was spared, because he is one of the most talented musicians I have ever had the pleasure of working with. If you have ever heard Nick play the piano, you know that he is a true talent just as a pianist. But Nick also excels as a composer. This requiem is an amazingly mature work of music from someone who is only fifteen years old!
“Because this work is a multi-movement concert piece, and a requiem, I would ask you to hold your applause until the end. Also at the end of the last movement, I have asked Father Robert d’Antonio of St. Cecilia’s church to give a short benediction. Given the subject matter of this music and its spiritual implications, I felt that a few words from a clergyman would be appropriate.”
David Molinari then walked over to the podium. He looked back at Daniel, who nodded his head that the band was ready. The performance was underway.
The first movement depicted the lives of the kids before they were grabbed. Entitled “Prelude of the Innocent Youth”, it began with a solo guitar introduction consisting of simple full barre chords in A major. Tim then added a simple rock beat as Daniel repeated the chord progression. Next Eric and Nick entered on bass and piano to establish a full rhythm section beat. Daniel switched to solo mode and played an instrumental melody lead line. The song had a simple and happy feel to it, and one could imagine kids playing outside having a good time. Because the kids he was writing about had such different backgrounds, Nick chose not to use lyrics in this song, but when the song reached its chorus, Daniel sang its melody using “la, la, la” syllables in its catchy refrain. At the end of the refrain, Daniel improvised a guitar solo that kept the mood quite upbeat.
The band then repeated the song, this time the melody played in duet with Jonathan on the alto saxophone. After the la-la chorus, Jonathan played a solo on saxophone. On the third repetition of the song, the mood began to subtly change. The piano chords became more complex and the string section added long sustained background notes that gradually became more and more dissonant. By the time Daniel was singing the syllables of the chorus, there was a lot of tension in the air, and the song now expressed the terror of the kids being captured. As the song came to its end, Daniel and Jonathan exchanged four bar solo lines that faded away as the music became softer and softer.
The choir then rose to sing the “Kyrie”. Nick set this movement from the ordinary of the mass in both the traditional Greek words and in English translation. A twisting and turning figure was stated by violas and clarinets and then echoed by the alto section of the choir as they sang “Kyrie eleison.” The full choir entered with the English translation, “Lord have mercy” in harmony while the twisting figure continued with the Greek words. Throughout the piece these two ideas were passed around through the sections of the choir and through the strings and woodwinds in the orchestra. Eventually a third theme, sung in unison octaves and employing wide leaping intervals was introduced and echoed by the brass section.
The simple twisting idea was then restated, but set to the words “Christe eleison” (Christ have mercy), the second part of the prayer. As in the first part of the Kyrie, the themes were passed through the different sections of the choir and orchestra as it gradually built to a climax. The third part of the “Kyrie” returned to the original text. The themes were restated but this time with a driving accompaniment using the string section, timpani, and the piano. This section had a real sense of urgency as it built to a third climax point. Then the accompaniment continued in a long fade out coda, as the choir sang extended four part harmonizations of the words “Lord, have mercy.”
The mood in the concert hall was now very somber as Daniel and the band got up to perform the third movement, “Lament.” This was the song that Nick had first shown to Daniel describing the despair and terror of being a captive. Now Daniel was the voice of one of those kids as he stood up and sang the very emotional and gut wrenching lyrics appealing to prophets and saints to answer his prayer and warning other children to beware.
The music started with a simple chord progression and drum beat that gave the impression of hope tinged with sadness. Daniel’s beautiful tenor voice soared through the auditorium as he sang the first choruses and verse. Nick had added two more verses, the second verse appealing to St. Clotilde, the patron saint of children. As Daniel sang the second chorus and verse, Jonathan began playing some simple fills on his soprano saxophone. The sound of that instrument had just the right element of poignancy for the Lament.
Daniel sang:
Chorus: Clotilde, Clotilde, Clotilde, can you hear my prayer?
Clotilde, Clotilde, does anyone out there care?
Verse 2:
Captured and denied a normal life
I’m abused and tortured in this cell,
Separated from the light of day
Is there any way for me to tell?
How much more pain can my body take?
How much more fear can my mind absorb?
Will I escape from this living hell?
Or is what I’m facing that dreaded knell?
After Daniel repeated the second chorus, Jonathan played a brief interlude. Then Daniel played and sang the final choruses and verse appealing to St. Michael the Archangel for justice.
Chorus: Saint Michael, Saint Michael, Saint Michael, can you hear my prayer?
Saint Michael, Saint Michael, does anyone out there care?
Verse 3:
Can you sound your trumpet loud and clear?
I need someone now to set me free!
Can you bring the mighty hand of God?
To smite the men who torture me!
How much more pain can my body take?
How much more fear can my mind absorb?
Is there a way from this treachery?
Or is their great evil meant to be?
Following Daniel’s repeat of the last chorus, Jonathan took off on an extended solo. It was one of his finest moments ever as a player. He took the audience through moments of simple lyricism, intense virtuosity, soaring happiness and deep despair. Every sixteen bars or so, Daniel, Eric, and Nick sang back up vocals, simple three part harmony on the words Elijah, Clotilde, and St. Michael. There were audible sniffles and sobs coming from the audience as Jona
than ended his solo and the song with a long extended high note.
[Editors note: a copy of the piano-vocal score to Lament is in the appendix.]
Movement four started very simply with two sets of the traditional three note death knell, G-G-D, G-G-D, played by the chimes. The “Dies Irae”, the medieval song of death, used here to represent the murder of the kids, was beginning. Nick’s setting was simple but frighteningly effective. After the chimes, he had all of the drums and timpani play a march-like cadence, but with no snares on, so the sound was not military but more like the approach of a demon. Every now and then the chimes would add the three note death knell to the mix. Even Tim joined in on his drum set. After the relentless thundering cadence of the drums was established, the Dies Irae theme was started by the horn section in its lowest register. The chant-like theme was then repeated a number of times, each time building in intensity as more brass instruments were added — tubas, trombones, and trumpets in their lowest register. The theme was gradually harmonized, moving from simple to more complex chords.
On its last repetition the full brass section played the theme while the upper woodwinds played an ornamented triplet countermelody. Nick ended the movement with a spectacular eight bar coda, filled with dramatic modern harmonies and cymbal crashes. The grim reaper had arrived.
Chapter 34
Requiem, Part 2
(Tuesday Evening, late October)
A series of brilliant fanfares in three parts that were sounded by the trumpet section and echoed by the horns changed the entire mood from one of despair to one of hope. Movement five, “Tuba mirum”, was a call for justice and a summons for avenging angels. Soon the entire brass section was joining in on the call for justice. As the momentum of the music increased in power and volume, the upper woodwinds entered with high piercing scales and trills. Now the timpani, chimes, cymbals and drums were not part of a death march, but adding power and excitement to the fanfares. St. Michael the Archangel was being summoned in a very dramatic fashion. The string section added more body to the sound, doubling the woodwind lines and playing a long series of tremolos.
At the end of the Tuba mirum, the timpani and drums played a long roll while the choir stood up. It was time for movement six, “Rex tremendae”.
The choir sang these words accompanied by the full orchestra:
King of awesome majesty, omnipotent!
All powerful! Dispenser of justice!
You freely save those worthy of salvation
Save them, these poor helpless children,
Show them pity for what they endured.
It was a very electrifying moment, as the powerful music resounded through the hall. Sitting in his seat next to Laura, Jason felt chills going up his spine. He had been holding her hand ever since Daniel sang the “Lament”, and now he squeezed it even tighter. There was a similar impact on other audience members throughout the California Theater. It was like a brilliant light was now shining, lighting up the darkness and despair, creating hope and the first sense of closure. The music spent several minutes with the first three lines of the text, repeating and developing each fragment text with different musical settings. As the choir sang through the last two lines, the sound was calmer for a little while. Then there was a crescendo into a huge finish, ending with a flourish of brass and percussion
With two thirds of the music now performed, and the loudest and most bombastic movements finished, the focus of the requiem now went back to the lost children. Movement seven, “Song of the Lost Souls” was sung by Daniel and accompanied with just his band members. The lyrics described how the souls of the murdered kids were still floating and needed closure. None of those children had received a proper burial or memorial service when their lives were cruelly taken away from them. No family or friends were there with them when they died. “All alone and wandering, our spirits try to go home…” the lyrics cried out. The folk song style of the music was perfect for Daniel’s voice as he again took on the persona of one of the kids asking for release and a pathway to heaven.
“Song of the Lost Souls” was written as mostly a dialogue between the piano and the guitar. After each verse, Nick and Daniel traded several brief four bar solo improvisations. Jonathan played some simple flute lines, but they were back up lines and not solos.
The answer to the “Song of the Lost Souls” came in movement eight, “Lux Aeterna” which was sung by the choir. The music was performed mostly a capella, with minimal accompaniment from the piano and string orchestra. The soprano and alto sections divided into two parts for much of the song, and the girls of the Merriam High School advanced choir performed the music with a shimmering clarity. The words, which were sung in English, were a prayer to grant closure and a final peace to the souls of the children.
Let everlasting light shine on them, O Lord with your
saints forever: for you art merciful.
Eternal rest grant them, O Lord;
and let perpetual light shine upon them.
With your saints forever, for Thou art merciful.
As the choir was performing, Daniel looked back to watch Diana, who was singing with the second soprano section. He smiled, thinking of how he had progressed as a performer since the two of them sang a duet at the funeral for Eric’s mother.
As the choir finished the “Lux Aeterna”, the music ascended to a simple C major chord, which became Daniel’s cue for movement nine, the final part to Requiem for the Lost Children.
Daniel began strumming a vamp between a C major chord and an F/G chord. Again there was some folk song quality to the writing, but “The Freedom Song” had more of a revival feeling to it. When Nick was composing the requiem, he knew that he wanted to have something uplifting and spirited at the end. After forty-five minutes of somber and gut wrenching music, the audience needed a break. Nick remembered how funerals in New Orleans would be somber and then a Dixieland band would strike up a tune and cheer everyone up. He felt that the kids he was writing for would like something like that, too.
After the rest of the rhythm section joined in to set up the song’s groove, Daniel stepped up to the microphone and started singing the lyrics of the “Freedom Song” with back up vocals by Nick and Eric.
At last freedom we have found
And it has a happy sound.
Halleluiah, Halleluiah!
There is laughter in the air
You can hear it everywhere.
Halleluiah, Halleluiah!
There were several short bridges to the song that Nick had written to contrast the simple couplet lyrics. Soon the choir got involved. They began clapping their hands on beats 2 and 4 and joined Daniel, Eric, and Nick in singing the Halleluiahs. Then the orchestra entered, the violins playing fiddle tunes and the brass echoing the Halleluiahs. During the instrumental interlude Daniel said to the audience, “Come on! Put your hands together!” and the hall began to rock a little. Daniel, Nick, and Jonathan all played solos, and then they returned to the vocals, building up to a big finish on the Halleluiahs.
Nick knew also that the requiem was still a serious piece and needed an extended coda ending to tie everything together. He did that with a series of long extended chords, sometimes sung with the word “Amen” by the choir, sometimes played by the wind instruments and sometime by the string orchestra. Over these simple textures Daniel improvised solo lines on his guitar while Jonathan answered with flute improvisations. As the movement wound down to its ending, Nick created an ascending effect by gradually eliminating the bass and lower range instruments, and then the middle range instruments until there were only violins and woodwinds in their highest register moving back and forth in a modified plagal cadence, Fm6 to C major.
As the last strains of the music ended, the audience was once again silent. Father d’Antonio quickly stepped up to the microphone for the benediction.
“Tonight we have heard a wonderful and moving performance by your sons and daughters, an affirmation of the good that is in th
e world, and a reminder that we must always be vigilant to prevent the spread of evil that unfortunately still exists among us. Whatever your faith or personal beliefs may be, I know we all can agree that the souls of the young children celebrated in this extraordinary requiem have been provided a guidepost to the afterlife through the efforts of the teenagers performing on this stage. Please join me in a brief prayer.
“Our heavenly Father, we thank you for the gift of music and ask for your blessing on these performers. We ask that you accept the souls of those unfortunate children who met such untimely and cruel deaths so they can participate in your eternal afterlife in a state of joy and fulfillment. We ask that you watch over the lives of our young people and deliver them from evil. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen.”
After Father d’Antonio finished the benediction, there was about twenty seconds of silence, and then the audience erupted into thunderous applause. David Molinari had worked out a plan for the bows at the dress rehearsal and then went through the order as he had set it. First he had the choir stand, next the wind and percussion players, then the string orchestra, and finally he acknowledged Daniel, Nick, Eric, Tim, and Jonathan. After everyone had been given their bows, he and the band members went off stage.
The applause continued without let up, and they went back on stage for their curtain calls. First David Molinari went out with Lucas Moss. Then out came Eric and Tim, then Jonathan, Daniel, and finally Nick. As each person came out, the ovations became louder and people started standing up in the audience. After Nick’s entrance everyone stood up and all of the other performers were applauding and cheering as well. David Molinari and Lucas Moss went to shake hands with Nick along with Daniel and the other band members who also gave Nick hugs.
Eyewitness News Page 25