These are songs for Mezzo Soprano and Piano that I wrote a few months ago and were performed at the latest Circles and Lines concert in December. I’ll hopefully have recordings for you all soon. The texts are below each blurb about the piece.
Mezzo-Soprano, Piano Score of Love Songs
The cycle is intended to have a key around F (but I have no problem with transpositions). The first song, To Mary takes the hyper simple motif of a scale and plays around with it. It’s in Ternary form (An F Minor-C Minor-F Minor harmonic under pinning) that is achieved just by raising Db to a D natural, the difference between F Minor and C minor. The introduction’s scalar patterns have this effect going on in a microcosm of the entire work’s harmonic structure.
Beloved! amid the earnest woes
That crowd around my earthly path-
(Drear path, alas! where grows
Not even one lonely rose)-
My soul at least a solace hath
In dreams of thee, and therein knows
An Eden of bland repose.And thus thy memory is to me
Like some enchanted far-off isle
In some tumultuous sea-
Some ocean throbbing far and free
With storms- but where meanwhile
Serenest skies continually
Just o’er that one bright island smile.-Edgar Allan Poe
The second song in the set, Hymn, is also in ternary form, with a harmonic arc of Bb, Eb, Bb. The idea, once again, is to have the plagal micro-surface-motion that is heard in the bell like beating of the piano to also be reflected in the larger harmonic structure. The harmonic language I used in this work was an attempt to explore how extended dissonances can rub up against the basic supporting chordal units, yet still maintain a consonant quality. What I ended up with were some very colorful affects.
At morn – at noon – at twilight dim –
Maria! thou hast heard my hymn!
In joy and woe – in good and ill –
Mother of God, be with me still!
When the hours flew brightly by,
And not a cloud obscured the sky,
My soul, lest it should truant be,
Thy grace did guide to thine and thee;
Now, when storms of Fate o’ercast
Darkly my Present and my Past,
Let my Future radiant shine
With sweet hopes of thee and thine!-Edgar Allan Poe
Sonnet 138 was an exploration of axial tonality. I chose a mode of B, C Db, F, F#, G and tried to construct a key center of C but not stray too far into a limited version of functional tonality (by going C-F-G-C). Most of the chords and melodies are constructed through interval quality with which I tried to maximize angularity. The work is a sonata form, but that is coincidental as the real goal was to fashion a symmetrical form that reflected the mode.
When my love swears that she is made of truth
I do believe her, though I know she lies,
That she might think me some untutor’d youth,
Unlearned in the world’s false subtleties.
Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young.
Although she knows my days are past the best,
Simply I credit her false speaking tongue:
On both side thus is simple truth suppress’d:
But wherefore says she not she is unjust?
And wherefore say not I that I am old?
O! love’s best habit is in seeming trust,
And age in love loves not to have years told:
Therefore I lie with her and she with me,
And in our faults by lies we flatter’d be.-Shakespeare
In the recent performance, the order of Hymn and Sonnet 138 were switched. I am currently conflicted about the order, because the performance order I just mentioned has much a better arc and a more fulfilling aesthetic purpose. I also find that Bb Hymn can make sense right before the final key area of F major in The Arrow and The Song as it reflects the plagal motion instilled in it. Alternatively, the key area of C in Sonnet 138 fits the more traditional billing of being the dominant to The Arrow and The Song‘s final tonic in F. I believe that in future editions of this work I am going to have the order be:
- To Mary
- Sonnet 138
- Hymn
- The Arrow and The Song
Traditional harmonic practice isn’t all that good of a reason to keep something that wants to be a certain way from being that way.
The Arrow and The Song is a cute show piece with three sections for each stanza in the text the song is based on. This work was mainly about exploring text painting while throwing bizarre notes into what is really just simple, functional harmony to reflect the jocularity of the text. The text is kind of cheesy and cheerful, so it’s hard not to have a bright compositional color.
I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow