WAR LAMENT, Choral Cycle After Siegfried Sassoon
Harold Blumenfeld
About this work:
WAR LAMENT after Siegfried Sassoon, for Chorus with Guitar. In Four Parts:
[I]AUTUMN.
[II] BEFORE THE BATTLE.
[III] SUICIDE IN TRENCHES.
[IV] THE DEATH BED.
Choral settings of powerful poetry of Sassoon, laureate of the World War...
Anti-war literature set with
music-compositional textures going far beyond a capella norms. Textures range from strong unisons to complex divisions in as many as 14 parts...
Recorded ALBANY RECORDS: TROY 443. Gregg Smith Singers, Gregg Smith, conducting.
Numerous SOUND BITES, Sample SCORE PAGES downloadable on this site...
Former Pub. MMB Music, now closed. Published by COMPOSER: blumenf@wustl.edu
Score, choral part: $20...
***REVIEW:
"Blumenfeld writes movingly of what these texts suggest to him. Siegfried Sassoon was a British poet who saw action on the Western Front of the Great War and lived to tell the tale. Blumenfeld turns the poet's fierce disenchantment into an edgy condemnation of war everywhere.".."Albany wraps it up with fine sound and interesting notes." - Greenfield, American Record Guide.
Sound Bites from "BEFORE THE BATTLE", "SUICIDE IN TRENCHES" and "THE DEATH BED"... Sample Score Pages available from various of the movements...
Text Excerpts:
[I] "Autumn":
"OCTOBER'S BELLOWING ANGER BREAKS AND CLEAVES THE BRONZED BATTALIONS
OF THE STRICKEN WOOD, IN WHOSE LAMENT
I HEAR A VOICE THAT GRIEVES
AND THE FEUD OF OUTRAGED MEN..."
[II] "Before the Battle":
"...I HAVE NO NEED TO PRAY
THAT FEAR MAY PASS AWAY.
I SCORN THE GROWL AND RUMBLE
OF THE FIGHT THAT SUMMONS ME
FROM COOL SILENCE OF MARSH AND POOL.."
[III] "Suicide in Trenches":
"...YOU SMUG-FACED CROWDS
WITH KINDLING EYEWHO CHEER
WHEN SOLDIER LADS MARCH BY,
SNEAK HOME AND PRAY
YOU'LL NEVER KNOW THE HELL
WHERE YOUTH AND LAUGHTER GO."
Cycle concludes with "THE DEATH BED", its most extended and dramatic part: Voice of Death claims agonizing, dying soldier. Here follows text of initial part of its Sound Bite:
"RAIN, HE COULD HEAR IT RUSTLING THROUGH THE DARK. FRAGRANCE AND PASSIONLESS MUSIC WOVEN AS ONE; RUSTLING, PATTERING SHOWERS THAT SOAK THE WOODS.
A TRICKLING PEACE GENTLY AND SLOWLY
WASHING LIFE AWAY."...
"HE STIRRED, SHIFTING HIS BODY,
THEN THE PAIN LEAPED LIKE A
PROWLING BEAST, AND GRIPPED AND TORE
HIS GROPING DREAMS WITH GRINDING CLAWS AND FANGS. BUT SOMEONE STOOD BESIDE HIM...SOON HE LAY SHUDDERING
BECAUSE THAT EVIL THING HAD PASSED..."
[shortly, the poem continues:]
"...And Death who'd stepped toward him
paused and stared... Light many lamps
and gather round his bed. Lend him warm blood and will to live. You may save him yet. But Death replied: 'I choose him'. So he went."
Year composed: 1975
Duration: 00:13:08
Ensemble type: Chorus, with or without Solo Voices:Chorus with One Non-Keyboard Instrument
Instrumentation: ,1 Guitar (Classical/Acoustic) soloist(s), 6 S, 4 SS, 4 A, 6 T, 4 TT, 4 B
Instrumentation notes: Guitar used with discretion: short interludes; explosive intervention at crucial point in "Suicide in Trenches". No guitar in "Death Bed", work's large, dramatic finale.
Work can be performed a capella, without guitar.
Wide range of choral texture, mood, temperature.
A demanding, dramatic neo-tonal work.