Saint-Saëns’ colorful Messe de Requiem op. 54, originally opulently scored, is published here in an ingenious reduced version, so that smaller choirs, and choirs with more limited resources of space or finance can also perform this attractive work with smaller instrumental forces.

The original large forces – quadruple wind and brass and four harps – may have been a reason why the expressive and richly colored work was less well-known than the composer’s Oratorio de Noël (Carus 40.455), a ...