Anang (A Star)

Andrew Balfour (b. 1967)

Anang (A Star) is dedicated to my wonderful wife, who told me about the Indigenous understanding of the Star People, who are among us, representing where we all came from, the Universe and the stars.

– Andrew Balfour

Northern Lights

Ola Gjeilo (b. 1978)

Set to the Latin Pulchra Es text from Song of Solomon, the music is also inspired by the ethereal aurora borealis phenomenon, or northern lights.

A Poplar and the Moon*

Jeff Enns (b. 1972)

The poetry of Siegfried Sassoon is often quirky and surprising, and different than that of other so called World War I poets, of which Sassoon is a member. A Poplar and the Moon has wonderful imagery in it. There is beauty, mystery and magic in the shadows and moonlight. He often has the two sides of an image – darkness and light – contained within a poem and sometimes within a single line.

This provides a composer with many opportunities to bring out images from the text. I was drawn to the image of the shadow bridge between heaven and the author as well as the other images joining heaven and earth, such as the lilies and stars. In this season of All Saints and Remembrance it is very meaningful to be reminded of the close ties between us and those that have gone before us.

In setting this text I attempted to touch on numerous images. The tall and upright tree, the shimmering moonlight casting shadows, the jig-like quality of the blustering winds, the fugal moment of magic coming from different voices, and the final litany that leads us to the lilies and stars together. Like the poem, I tried to keep all of the different images contained within the piece as a whole, rather than multiple sections, to keep the flow from beginning to ending.

– Jeff Enns

hope, faith, life, love

from Three Songs of Faith

Eric Whitacre (b. 1970)

In 1999 I was commissioned by Northern Arizona University to write a set of choral works commemorating the 100th anniversary of their school of music. I chose three of my favorite E.E. Cummings texts and started writing. i will wade out, the first piece in the set, seemed to cry out with lush, neo-romantic harmonies. The third, i thank You God for most this amazing day, is such a beautiful and joyous poem that the music was at times almost effortless. It was the middle installment, hope, faith, life, love, that was causing me to lose sleep.

In hope, faith, life, love the original poem is actually quite long, with sounds of clashing and flying and singing, and calls for music that is vibrant and virtuosic, a real show piece. The more I thought about faith, however, the more introspective I became, and I modified the poem entirely to fit that feeling. I took only the first four words (hope, faith, life, love) and the last four (dream, joy, truth, soul) and set each of them as a repeating meditation. Each of the words, in turn, quotes a different choral work from my catalog, and its corresponding musical material comments on the word I set (i.e. the word “life” quotes the musical material from Cloudburst, where the text is “roots, trunk, branches, birds, stars”). Because I wrote it last, the middle movement even quotes the first and the last piece in this set on the word “soul.”

– Eric Whitacre

Constellation

Frank Ticheli (b. 1958)

i. From the Sea
ii. The Falling Star
iii. There will be Stars

Comprising three swift movements set to Sara Teasdale’s poetry, this composition is designed for unaccompanied mixed chorus. The composer employs the enduring symbolism of stars to evoke beauty and peace.

-Hinshaw Music

Sa nuit d’été

No. 1 from Nocturnes

Morten Lauridsen (b. 1943)

Lux Aeterna

After “Nimrod” from Enigma Variations

Edward Elgar (1857–1934), arr. John Cameron

Picikîsksîs Chant

Sherryl Sewepagaham (b. 1970)

I Am Not Yours*

Gerda Blok-Wilson (b. 1955)

I’ve long admired Teasdale’s poetry for its emotional depth and exploration of themes like love, longing, independence, and identity. Her work speaks to universal human experiences, and I tried to capture that essence in this piece, reflecting the balance between companionship and self-possession in her life.

In “I Am Not Yours,” the speaker grapples with the tension between losing oneself in love and retaining individuality—a struggle that may feel especially difficult for women. Teasdale’s words express this paradox, which I’ve tried to convey musically through such things as harmonies and vocal textures. My goal was for Chronos Vocal Ensemble to bring the vulnerability and emotional depth of her poetry to life, evoking both the overwhelming nature of love and the need to stay true to oneself.

For the theme “Trail of Light,” the poem’s imagery—like “a candle lit at noon” and “a snowflake in the sea”—reflects love’s fleeting, transient nature, while the night sky perhaps symbolizes both the vastness and impermanence of connection.

-Gerda Blok-Wilson

In a Railroad Station

David von Kampen (b. 1986)

“In a Railroad Station” paints Sara Teasdale’s text into the fabric of the music. The relentlessly busy piano part is the “shrill electric light,” the “whirling din.” The drawn-out melodic lines sung by the choir depict the slow-motion farewell that is occurring between two people as chaos swirls around them.

The Eighth of September

Peter-Anthony Togni (b. 1959)

Your Stars To Hold

Stuart Beatch (b. 1991)

This piece was written in December 2019 as a Christmas gift for Christopher Hawn. The text, by American poet Sara Teasdale, depicts love as an act of comfort and assurance, using cosmic imagery to express the profound safety found in the arms of a loved one. My music tries to capture this warmth through a lush harmonic language and thick choral textures, culminating in a simple repetition of the titular line—suddenly inward and intimate, as if gently whispered.

“Your Stars to Hold” won the 2019 Composition Competition by Chronos Vocal Ensemble, and was first performed in Edmonton in November 2021.

Soneto de la noche

No. 2 from Nocturnes

Morten Lauridsen (b. 1943)