(originally published by The Student ) Where the theatricality of opera and the sobriety of religion meet, we find Verdi’s Requiem - a huge undertaking and a powerful piece of music for the Edinburgh University Music Society to perform, and one which merits a similarly huge and impressive back-drop. With four soloists, a double choir and full orchestra, McEwan Hall is filled almost to the brim with our suited-and-booted players, and the effect is not only visually impressive but orally overwhelming. Sound billowing out into the space with which the orchestra is so clearly familiar; awesome surges of power and piercing solos made possible by an acute knowledge of their surroundings. By turns moody and monstrous, the Requiem was written in memory of one of Verdi’s contemporaries, and was performed repeatedly by captives during the Second World War. With its roots in the Catholic Mass ceremony and its turns through mourning and peace towards joy and biblical wrath, it’s