This is a setting of five poems that reflect the cycle of life. It was written for one of my students, Rachel Wyllie, who was studying for her Masters degree in singing at York University. It is rather like a string quartet but with the viola replaced by the singer. The string instruments and the voice all work as equal partners.
The songs are quite freely ‘through composed’ with relatively little conventional structuring. I have tried to ‘paint’ the words of the poem and reflect the moods with my use of melodic shapes and harmonies.
The first song, ‘Day Birth’ is written in the free, somewhat operatic style, at times reminiscent of ‘recitativo stromentato’.
‘Life Within You’ uses pizzicato strings throughout and is rather more regular in composition to reflect the liveliness and innocence of a developing baby.
In ‘Life’ the changes of mood in the poem are reflected by changes of momentum in the music.
The setting of the well-known poem, ‘Do Not Stand at my Grave and Weep’ uses an opening phrase that was written by Rachel. It is taken from her own setting of this poem that she wrote as part of her A Level music examination.
The cycle is completed with ‘Birth of a new Day’ and passages of the freer style of writing are prevalent in this song as they were in the first.
This performance was given as part of the recital that Rachel gave for her Masters degree examination. The string players were also students at the university.
