Father William
Karen P. Thomas
About this work:
Father William is from the collection, Four Lewis Carroll Songs, composed and premiered in 1989 by Seattle Pro Musica, and awarded the 1991 Melodious Accord Composition prize. The work has been performed by numerous choral ensembles throughout the United States, and in Norway.
The four poems (Turtle Soup, Father William, Jabberwocky, and Speak roughly) are found in Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking-Glass, and are immediately familiar to most listeners. Turtle Soup is the song sung to Alice by the Mock Turtle, "in a voice chocked with sobs", while Father William is a poem recited by Alice to the hookah-puffing caterpillar. Jabberwocky, the famous poem which Alice reads by holding it up to a looking-glass, is full of unusual words which are explained by Humpty-Dumpty thusly: "brillig - four o'clock in the afternoon; "slithy toves - lithe and slimy creatures something like a badger, a lizard and a corkscrew; gyre - to go round like a gyroscope; gimble - to make holes like a gimlet; mimsy - flimsy and miserable; borogove - a thin, shabby looking bird, something like a live mop; mome raths - green pigs, who've lost their way; outgrabe - something between bellowing and whistling, with a sneeze in the middle." (The other words are left to the reader's imagination.) Finally, Speak roughly is sung by the Duchess to her howling, sneezing baby, who later turns into a pig. Each movement may be performed separately.
Version: (from Four Lewis Carroll Songs)
Year composed: 1989
Duration: 00:03:00
Ensemble type: Chorus, with or without Solo Voices:Chorus, Unaccompanied
Instrumentation: 1 S, 1 A, 1 T, 1 B