"This song should win it all because 1) it's been the number 1 hit for the last 1500 years, and 2) no other song defied Nazis like this one did. Allow me to explain. For those not forced to take several semesters of Music History or didn't grow up in the Catholic church, a Requiem is specifically a mass for the dead. Already spooky enough, there is a specific section using the text "Dies irae", which is all about the Day of Wrath, or the final judgment day. The first instance that the Dies irae text was set to words was back in the Medieval times, and it is STILL one of the most quoted melodies in all of music history. Star Wars? Yep. The Lion King? Fun fact, it's Mufasa's theme, forecasting his death from the very beginning. Sweeney Todd? Nightmare before Christmas? It's basically the whole score. Home Alone. Frozen II. Dune. KPOP DEMON HUNTERS?? Yup - really explicitly in the beginning of "Your Idol" - "Dies irae" went Platinum this year. If you're still with me, may your Jack-o-Lanterns never mold. Here's where we get to fighting Nazis. The Verdi Requiem died off quickly after Verdi's death. It was revived (haunting!) in the early 1900s part due to Czech composer Rafael Schächter. Schächter was imprisoned in the Terezin concentration camp, and during his imprisonment, he taught 150 people the Requiem by rote. They did a total of 16 performances of the entire piece, starving and defiant. The Dies irae in particular they sang TO their imprisoners, using the Latin what they could not say out loud: the Nazi's Day of Wrath was coming and they would not be spared. You can read more about this history here: https://floridaorchestra.org/verdi-requiem-holocaust/. When you listen to this movement, you can hear them sing it. I have never experienced a more haunting feeling than hearing this live, knowing how this group of people used this music to spit in the faces of their oppressors. That's why the Dies irae movement from Verdi's Requiem deserves to be this year's champion. Also, it's a bop.” Cora Winstead