November Night [2024] c.8'
for SSATB Choir // Text by Adelaide Crapsey
Adelaide Crapsey [1878-1914] is a poet renowned for her invention of the cinquain form. When I first discovered her poem "November Night" [published 1915], I was utterly moved by her ability to craft an evocative and otherworldly atmosphere with only a few lines of text. My piece November Night [2024] creates a meditative experience for audiences, inviting listeners on an immersive journey through her poem– capturing the intimate nature of her text with sparse and ethereal soundscapes– creating a sense of sonic and linguistic ambiguity through an intricate layering of vowels and consonants.
Listen...
With faint dry sound,
Like steps of passing ghosts,
The leaves, frost-crisp'd, break from the trees,
And fall.