Kubla Khan
A setting of the poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, for solo voice and orchestra. The original conception of the piece called for a tenor soloist, but it is also suitable for soprano (sung an octave higher).
In the recording featured here Canadian mezzo-soprano Jennifer McKillop sings the vocal line. |
To view the poem, click here. |
Live with me and be my love
A setting for choir and piano of a poem by William Shakespeare - one of his "Sonnets to Sundry Notes of Music".
As listeners may realise this recording was produced totally in the digital domain, with the virtual choir courtesy of the "Symphonic Choirs" sampling software from East West Sounds. This is a first attempt at using it. |
To view the poem, click here.
To preview the score, click here. |
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Song Cycle: Poems of John McCrae
Settings of poems by Canadian poet John McCrae, scored for solo voice (soprano in the manuscript) and piano. In this the first set of six songs the poet's main preoccupation is with mortality and death.
In the recordings featured here the songs are transposed for countertenor, and sung by friend and fellow composer David Solomons. |
To view the poems, click here. |
Voyelles
A setting for choir and string orchestra of the poem by 19th-century French poet Arthur Rimbaud.
The poem was written in 1871 and is seemingly synaesthetic, drawing correspondences between vowels and colours. However, the arbitrariness of these correspondences, and Rimbaud's own admission that they were simply inventions, suggests the poem might have been written tongue-in-cheek. True or not, the music picks up on this possibility, supporting the fun with its cloyingly programmatic style.
In this recording the vocal parts are performed by the dwsChorale, the invention of David Solomons. |
To view the poem, click here.
To preview the score, click here. |
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