Requiem (KV626) – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) When Mozart died in the early morning hours of December 5, 1791, he left his final masterpiece, the Requiem, unfinished.  Less than three months later, a completed score of the Requiem was delivered to its anonymous commissioner. How was the Requiem completed and how would Mozart have completed it had he lived? These mysteries have tantalized musicians for over two centuries.   Mozart received the commission to compose the Requiem from a mysterious ‘Gray Messenger’ in the summer of 1791.  The Messenger paid half the commission in advance, but insisted on guarding his patron’s anonymity.  Already committed to compose an opera for the Bohemian Court, Mozart left for Prague and didn’t begin work on the Requiem until his return in September.  Before long he became convinced the Messenger had come to warn him of his own mortality and that he was indeed composing the work for his own death. Con...