Evening Song
For SATB and piano (2007), 3’
Text: Sidney Lanier
Finalist in the Shoreline Community Chorale’s (Madison, CT) 2010 Choral Composition Competition.
Premiered November 14, 2010, Madison, CT; Shoreline Community Chorale, conducted by Noah Glynn.
Program Notes
Sidney Lanier (1842-1881) was a poet, and also an accomplished flutist, from Georgia. His Evening Song, tells of two lovers on a beach at sunset, contrasting the changing patterns of the day with the unchanging nature of their love. My setting is unashamedly Romantic, with a more enigmatic middle section to accompany the richer, more exotic imagery of the 2nd stanza.
Evening Song
Sidney Lanier
Look off, dear Love, across the sallow sands,
And mark yon meeting of the sun and sea;
How long they kiss in sight of all the lands,
Ah! longer, longer we.
Now, in the sea's red vintage melts the sun
As Egypt's pearl dissolved in rosy wine
And Cleopatra night drinks all. 'Tis done,
Love, lay thine hand in mine.
Come forth, sweet stars, and comfort heaven's heart,
Glimmer, ye waves, 'round else unlighted sands;
Oh night! divorce our sun and sky apart
Never our lips, our hands.