The Taft School Music for a While concert series continues Sunday, March 3rd at 5:00 pm in the Taft School’s Woodward Chapel with A Concert of Remembrance: Requiem Op. 9 by Maurice Duruflé. The event is free and open to the public; tickets are not required.

Maurice Duruflé was among a group of French composers commissioned by the collaborationist French State in 1941 to compose extended works, from symphonies to operas. Commissioned to compose a symphonic poem, Duruflé chose a Requiem. The piece was not yet complete when the regime collapsed in 1944; he finished the work in 1947. The thematic material is mostly taken from the Mass for the Dead in Gregorian chant.

The March 3rd program will be conducted by Bruce Fifer, and feature the Taft School showcase choir, Collegium Musicum, accompanied by Cantus Excelsis and organist James Kennerley. Fifer, the choral music director at Taft, has performed on stage, in film, and across the globe. His storied career includes solo performances with the New York Philharmonic under Leonard Bernstein; Boston Symphony and the Buffalo Philharmonic under Michael Tilson Thomas; the Philadelphia Orchestra and National Symphony; and numerous opera roles with the Greenwich Symphony, Bel Canto Opera, Manhasset Opera, L’Ensemble of New York, Eastern Opera, the Alice Tully Hall/PBS production of Deseret, among others.

Woodward Chapel is located at 25 The Green, in Watertown, CT, on the Taft School campus. For more information visit taftschool.org/concerts or call the box office at 860-945-7898.