DREAMS IN WAR TIME

DREAMS IN WAR TIME
7 Songs for Mezzo-Soprano and Piano
on Poems by Amy Lowell

Publisher
E. C. Schirmer Music Company

Catalog Number
8575

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Description
DREAMS IN WAR TIME was written in 2003, just after the war in Iraq began. Hall has remarked, “After 9/11 and two years of war in Afghanistan, the idea of more war was just so dark and heavy. I felt so sad about it all, that I just wanted somehow to express my despair. After searching for a while, I found the following set of poems by the early 20-century American poet Amy Lowell. Though the poetry does not depict the outward war directly, it does effectively paint a picture of the dark, bizarre, and twisted fragmentary feelings, images, and deep anxieties one has in our worst dreams and nightmares at such times as when war is raging.”

Text
1 – I wandered through a house of many rooms
2 – I dug a grave under an oak-tree
3 – I gambled with a silver money
4 – I painted the leaves of bushes red
5 – I followed a procession of singing girls
6 – I wished to post a letter
7 – I had made a kite

Vocal Range
G-flat 3  :  A-flat 5

Duration
19′ 00″

Vocal Tessitura
G 4  :  E 5

Year of Composition
2003

First Performance
May 15, 2011
Simsbury United Methodist Church
Simsbury, CT

First Performers
Amy Champagne, mezzo-soprano
Juliana Hall, piano

Listen
Amy Champagne, mezzo-soprano
Juliana Hall, piano