Songs of the Questioner words by richard le gallienne music by thomas lavoy for satb divisi with piano
evoking sound choral series james jordan, executive editor
GIA Publications, Inc.
cover art La nuit étoilée (The Starry Night), 1889 Vincent van Gogh, 1853–1890 Designed by Martha Chlipala
contents Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Libretto . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 I. What of the Darkness? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 II. A Lost Hour . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 III. Orbits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
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notes The first sketches of Songs of the Questioner came into being in the spring of 2012, when I was a third-year composition student at Westminster Choir College. I had initially planned “What of the Darkness?” as a standalone work for choir and piano, but after showing what I thought to be the final product to several of my close friends, I began to doubt the integrity of the piece. There were simply too many strong ideas crammed into a relatively short work. Feeling disheartened, I turned away from the compositional process and shelved the work, wisely keeping my hand-written notes and score fragments in a safe place. Two years passed, during which I would occasionally try to rework the music with little success. It wasn’t until I was invited back to the Choral Music Institute at Oxford as a visiting composer in 2014 that I made any serious headway. I found that my oblique position at the institute allowed me to better observe the individual transformations that occurred, as well as to garner a new sense of respect for the institute as a whole. I began to see that the Choral Institute at Oxford creates a safe environment for conductors to ask questions—not only verbal questions meant to hone their craft, but introspective questions of self identification and the nature of their art. Through observation I learned that the process of questioning is incredibly important to musical and personal development. I also came to realize the full extent of the impact my grandmother’s death had had on me two months prior to arriving in Oxford. Her death caused me to question everything in my life, and it wasn’t until spending a week in the calming monastic atmosphere of St. Stephen’s House that specific questions of faith, human nature, and love came into focus. At that point I turned again to Richard Le Gallienne’s English Poems and found two texts that, in conjunction with “What of the Darkness?”, created a narrative that matched what I observed to be at the heart of this questioning process. Songs of the Questioner brings us down the path that each of us takes as we recede into our minds to question important aspects of life. The literary device of the question mark is transmuted from a visual image on the page into a musical concept played by the piano; low pedal tones and broad, swirling harmonies in upper registers represent the ball and curl of the question mark respectively. The chorus and piano parts also have an unusual relationship in this work. The piano part contains the emotional heart of the work, the internal feeling of questioning oneself; the choir effectively “translates” the music using the text. In this way the piano represents our subconscious and wordless thought stream; the choir is of the conscious mind that attempts to decipher this stream in real time. There are many chant-like melodies within Songs of the Questioner, some of which are taken directly from the nightly compline service that we took part in during the Oxford institute. For me, chant embodies a point of contact between the natural mind and the human spirit, a brief moment in time when a community can reflect upon the connection between the physical world and whatever it is that animates us spiritually. As musicians deal in time, space, and the spirit constantly, the benefits of engaging in chant as a part of the questioning process cannot be overstated. —Thomas LaVoy
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songs of the questioner Texts by Richard Le Gallienne (1866–1947) from the collection English Poems, 4th ed. (1895)
I. What of the Darkness?
II. A Lost Hour
What of the darkness? Is it very fair?
God gave us an hour for our tears,
Are there great calms and find ye silence there? Like soft-shut lilies all your faces glow With some strange peace our faces never know,
One hour out of all the years, For all the years were another’s gold, Given in a cruel troth of old.
With some great faith our faces never dare. Dwells it in Darkness? Do you find it there? Is it a Bosom where tired heads may lie? Is it a Mouth to kiss our weeping dry? Is it a Hand to still the pulse’s leap? Is it a Voice that holds the runes of sleep? Day shows us not such comfort anywhere. Dwells it in Darkness? Do you find it there? Out of the Day’s deceiving light we call, Day that shows man so great and God so small, That hides the stars and magnifies the grass; O is the Darkness too a lying glass, Or, undistracted, do you find truth there? What of the Darkness? Is it very fair?
And how did we spend his boon? That sweet miraculous flower Born to die in an hour, Late born to die so soon. Did we watch it with breathless breath By slow degrees unfold? Did we taste the innermost heart of it The honey of each sweet part of it? Suck all its hidden gold To the very dregs of its death? Nay, this is all we did with our hour— We tore it to pieces, that precious flower; Like any daisy, with listless mirth, We shed its petals upon the earth; And, children-like, when it all was done, We cried unto God for another one.
III. Orbits Two stars once on their lonely way Met in the heavenly height, And they dreamed a dream they might shine alway With undivided light; Melt into one with a breathless throe, And beam as one in the night. And each forgot in the dream so strange How desolately far Swept on each path, for who shall change The orbit of a star? Yea, all was a dream, and they still must go As lonely as they are.
6 Dedicated to all participants of the Choral Institute at Oxford, 2014.
SONGS OF THE QUESTIONER Richard Le Gallienne (1866–1947) from English Poems, 4th ed. (1895)
Thomas LaVoy
To James Jordan and Corey Everly, for convincing me that this work was not complete in 2012.
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