h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: "L'Homme Arme: a mass for Peace," 2000, by Karl Jenkins - A88016259
Author: paulh, making lemonade from the lemons that life has given me - U176638

It is hard to write about "The Armed Man." The time that one spends reading might be just as well spent listening to the piece itself.

On the other hand, the piece can be appreciated more once one understands how the composer brought the different texts together. This is a "War requiem," so the Latin texts for a Mass are included. And yet, war is a global problem. Therefore, texts from non-Christian sources are also used. Poems are used for a variety of perspectives.

Thank you - I am not familiar with this piece of music, but I have been to the Royal Armouries museums A87837619 since the year 2000 so I may well have heard excerpts from it

One or two things I wondered when I read the Entry:

"the U.K.'s most popular piece of contemporary music" - I see this quote comes from ClassicFM. Makes me wonder what 'contemporary music' is, though - it's not pop music...

"As of 2005, its CD had sold more than 100,000 copies." - the CD was released in 2005, is that right, so it sold 100,000 in its first year?

"During the pandemic of 2020, Jenkins conducted a virtual version "recorded during lockdown by 5,000 singers from across the world" -- he called it the "Stay at Home choir."" - interesting Perhaps needs rephrasing a bit, though, to clarify that it is the 5,000 singers that were called the 'Stay at Home Choir', but they sang a version of the Mass for Peace.

Interesting snippet about Jenkins himself - I wonder if you might like to include a little more about him to put the work into context http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/music/sites/karl-jenkins/pages/biography.shtml

CD's have been released at different times. Wikipedia says
"The first CD release was recorded at Air Studios during summer of 2000 by The London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Karl Jenkins and The National Youth Choir of Great Britain conducted by Mike Brewer, and released on the Virgin label on September 10, 2001".

I'm guessing that it was the 2001 CD that sold 100,000 copies.

"Makes me wonder what 'contemporary music' is, though"

When I looked for definitions, I found that it means different things to different people. It's a quote from a classical music station. "Classical" means tested by time -- does 21 years count? I like the quote. If I changed it to "serious music" I'd have to explain things I'm not really equipped to explain. But I found a partial solution, and I've put a footnote (2) near the bottom of the page to explain.

Footnote (1) gives biograhical info about Jenkins.

I've clarified the Stay at Home Choir.