Requiem Mass

Musical setting of the mass for the dead.

(Requiem, Latin for “rest,” is the first word of the mass.) The requiem's text differs from the standard mass Ordinary in omitting its joyous sections and keeping only the Kyrie, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei, which are combined with other sections, including the sequence Dies irae (“Day of Wrath”). The first surviving polyphonic setting is by Johannes Ockeghem; celebrated later requiems include those of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Hector Berlioz, Giuseppe Verdi, Gabriel Fauré, Johannes Brahms, and Benjamin Britten.