The Crossing Donald Nally, conductor I want to live Innova 856 contemporary works for womenÕs choir william brooks, paul fowler, david lang I live in pain (2010) David Lang Six Mediaeval Lyrics (2006/2010) William Brooks I. Mens mea II. Anima mea III. Tu vite subsidium IV. Langueo V. Aprili tempore VI. Vale, dulcis amice I lie (2001) David Lang this condition (2005) David Lang PotterÕs Clay (2007) Paul Fowler evening morning day (2007) David Lang Statements (1970) Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen Echoes (2010) Paul Fowler I want to live (2005) David Lang The Crossing Kelly Ann Bixby Karen Blanchard 1 Maren Montalbano Brehm 2 Veronica Chapman-Smith 4 Anne Fuchs Joanna Gates Amanda Heisler Nina Heebink Lisa Juzwak Heidi Kurtz 2 Rebecca Siler 3 Karen Wapner Erin Westmaas Shari Wilson 3 Donald Nally, conductor John Grecia and Laura Ward, rehearsal accompanists 1 solo in I lie 2 duet in Six Mediaeval Lyrics, 1 3 duet in Six Mediaeval Lyrics, 3 4 solo in Six Mediaeval Lyrics, 5 Notes and Texts I live in pain David Lang (b. 1957, Los Angeles) The composer writes, ÒI wrote I live in pain as a present for my friends Donald Nally and the excellent Philadelphia chorus ÔThe Crossing.Õ The piece is a love song, and the text describes an intense longing for a lover who is no longer there. I was inspired to write the text by my attempts to read the works of the 12th-century troubadour, Beatriz de Dia, often referred to as the Contessa de Dia, probably the most famous woman troubadour. I say my Ôattempts to readÕ because she wrote in medieval Occitan, the antiquated version of a regional language of a small area in Southern France, which I donÕt speak or read. Luckily I found a translation of some of her texts into Italian, which I also donÕt really speak or read, but which I know at least well enough to push me in the direction of the text I finally made.Ó I live in pain For someone I once had, For someone I once wanted For someone I once knew For someone I once loved, without measure. I see now that he left me Because I did not give him all my love I see now I was wrong And now I sleep alone I want to hold him In my naked arms I want to lie beside him In my bed I want him more Than any long-forgotten lovers ever loved before I want to give him everything My heart My love My senses My sight My life Good friend, kind friend, fearless friend When will I have you? When will you lie beside me? When will I give you my love? You know how much I want you. Promise me You will do what I say Please. Do what I say. - David Lang, after Contessa de Dia (fl. late 12th century, Provence) Six Mediaeval Lyrics William Brooks (b. 1942, New York City) Six Mediaeval Lyrics was composed for the three solo voices of Trio Mediaeval in 2006 and recomposed (expanded in scope and texture) in 2010 for the womenÕs voices of The Crossing. The composer writes: ÒThe texts, drawn from Peter Dronke's landmark study, Medieval Latin and the Rise of the European Love-Lyric, span the full range of poetic styles. "Mens mea" is an elaborate game of wordplay the intricacies of which are untranslatable; "Langueo" is an instance of the compact snarls of syntax that Latin grammar makes possible. At the other extreme are "Anima mea" and "Vale, dulcis amice," both more epistles than poems, and both speaking directly from the heart. In between are more conventional but very affecting poems: "Tu vite subsidium" and the remarkable "Aprili tempore." The musical styles likewise range rather widely, although all are grounded in a synthetic system of quasi-medieval modes. Techniques range from the purely intuitive (in "Anima mea") through somewhat systematic homophony ("Vale, dulcis amice") to tightly regulated rhythmic counterpoint ("LangueoÓ).Ó I. Mens mea Mens mea se nescit, in me dolor iste senescit. Cur spiro? Cur sum? Non tendo quo volo cursum. Si pereo, rea tu, si sanor, es absque reatu. Cur in amore tepes? Maneat qui fert retro te pes. Res procul amote tristes, si dicis "Amo te." Liberor a morte! Mea, iam meus urit amor te. Mors retrahit morsum: quia dicis "Non tibi mors," sum. Qui meus est, noster sit amor. Beat hoc ita nos ter. My mind does not know itself, in me this sorrow grows old. Why breathe? Why exist? I cannot take the course I wish. If I die, you are guilty, if I am healed, you are cleared. Why in love are you tepid? Restrain that which makes you back away. All is banished that is sad, if you say "I love you." I am freed from death! My own, now my love burns you. Death retracts its sting: because you say "no death for you," I live. What is mine, ours shall be: love. It thereby blesses us thrice. II. Anima mea Anima mea consummabitur dolore e merore repleta, quia a memoria tua funditus videor deleta, que fidem et dilectionem semper a te sperabam, usque ad vite consummationem. Numquid care mea est enea, aut mens mea saxea, aut oculi mei lapidei, ut non doleam malum infortunii mei? Quid feci? Quid feci? In quo invenior rea? Vale, vale . . . My soul will be destroyed, filled by undiluted sorrow, because from your memory I seem utterly expunged, I who for faith and love always from you hoped, even to the end of life. Do you think my body is made of bronze, or my mind of rock, or my eyes of stones, that I should not lament the severity of my misfortune? What have I done? What have I done? In what am I found guilty? Farewell, farewell . . . III. Tu vite subsidium Tu vite subsidium mortisque suplicium esse poteris: Tu me deseris, mori pateris; Dulcis et amena, serena, Tu me noli despicere. Scis quod amo, quod inclamo te. Scis quod volo, quia colo te. Scis quod nosco, quia posco te. Scis quod spero, quia quero te. You, life's sustenance or death's torment can be; If you desert me, to death you expose me; sweet and lovely, serene, Do not disdain me. You know that I love you, that I call upon you. You know that I aspire, because I cherish you. You know that I understand, because I ask for you. You know that I hope, because I seek for you. IV. Langueo Langueo Ñ sed pereo, Dum amoris Ñ sed furoris, Saucior Ñ sed crucior, Telo Ñ sed tormento I languish Ñ no, I die, From love's no, frenzy'sÉ I am woundedÑ no, tortured Éspear no, rack! V. Aprili tempore Aprili tempore quod nuper transiit fidelis imago coram me adstitit. Me vocans dulciter pauxillum tetigit; oppressa lacrimis vox eius deficit, Suspirans etenim loqui non valuit. Illius a tactu nimis intremui, velud exterrita sursum insilui, Extensis brachiis corpus applicui; Exsanguis penitus tota deriguiÉ Evanuit enim! Nichil retinui! Sopore libera exclamo fortiter: "Quo fugis, amabo? Cur tam celeriter? Siste gradum, si vis inibo pariter, nam tecum vivere volo perhenniter!" Mox me penituit dixisse taliter. Aperte fuerant fenestre solii, fulgebant pulcriter Diane radiiÑ Heu me! Hue miseram! Tam diu dolui, fluxerunt per genas ploratus rivuli; Donec in crastinum nunquam abstinui. In the April that has just passed my true love's image stood before me. Calling me sweetly, he touched me slightly; overcome by tears his voice failed, Sighing because speech had no strength. Touched by him I trembled greatly, as if affrighted I leapt up, Extending my arms I pressed my body to him, utterly drained of blood I frozeÉ For he vanished! I held nothing! Freed from sleep I cried loudly: "Where do you flee, beloved? Why so swiftly? Stay, or if you wish I will enter equally, for with you I wish to live eternally!" Soon I regretted having spoken thus. Open had been standing the windows to the sun, to the beautiful shining rays of DianaÑ Oh, me! Oh, misery! For so long I grieved, flowing over my cheeks rivers of tears; Until the morrow never did I cease. VI. Vale, dulcis amice Vale, dulcis amice, sine te procul hinc habiturus Anxius abscedo, quia non cito sum rediturus. Non discedo tamen totus, remanet quia tecum Mens mea corque meum. Discedo vix ego mecum. Farewell, sweet friend, without you far from here I go, full of care, for I cannot easily return. Yet I do not depart completely, for there remains with you My mind and my heart. I take with me hardly any part of me. I lie David Lang The composer writes: ÒI chose this particular text because it has a darkly expectant feeling about it. It isnÕt about being happy or sad or miserable or redeemed; rather, it is about waiting for happiness or sadness or misery or redemption. As is the case in many Yiddish songs, something as ordinary as a girl waiting for her lover can cast many darker, more deeply beautiful shadows.Ó Written as a wedding gift, I lie was commissioned by Kitka, an Oakland-based womenÕs chorus focused largely on Eastern European womenÕs vocal traditions. Leyg ikh mir in bet arayn Un lesh mir oys dos fayer Kumen vet er haynt tsu mir Der vos iz mire tayer Banen loyfn tsvey a tog Eyne kumt in ovnt KhÕher dos klingen Ð glin glin glon Yo, er iz shoyn noent Shtundn hot di nakht gor fil Eyns der tsveyter triber Eyne iz a fraye nor Ven es kumt mayn liber Ikh her men geyt, men klapt in tir, Men ruft mikh on baym nomen Ikh loyf arop a borvese Yo! er iz gekumen! I lie in bed and turn out the light my beloved will come today The trains come twice a day one comes at night hear them clanging - glin, glin, glon Yes, he is near The night has many hours each one sadder than the next only one is happy when my beloved comes Someone comes, someone knocks someone calls my name I run out barefoot Yes, he has come. this condition David Lang The impact of LangÕs I lie on the work of The Crossing cannot be underestimated; we first sang it in Spoleto, Italy in 2007 and it became a kind of ÔanthemÕ that summer and autumn, inspiring a friendship with its composer that has produced two new works and countless performances. Soon after, David visited me in Chicago with a packet of music that included a work called The Little Match Girl Passion (which was to win the Pulitzer Prize just a few months later). Since then, he has passed on to us various other works he accurately identified as perfect for our ensemble, including this condition, a wholly different work than I lie, but equally as engaging for the women of The Crossing. this condition was premiered by Amuse Singers in New York City in 2005. In this condition: stirred not only by men but by women, fat and thin, naked and clothed; by teenagers and children in latency; by animals such as horses and dogs; by certain vegetables such as carrots, zucchinis, eggplants, and cucumbers; by fruits such as melons, grapefruits, and kiwis; by certain plant parts such as petals, sepals, stamens, and pistils; by the bare arm of a wooden chair, a round vase holding flowers, a little hot sunlight, a plate of pudding, a person entering a tunnel in the distance, a puddle of water, a hand alighting on a smooth stone, a hand alighting on a bare shoulder, a naked tree limb; by anything curved, bare, and shining, as the limb or bole of a tree; by any touch, as the touch of a stranger handling money; by anything round and freely hanging, as tassels on a curtain, as chestnut burrs on a twig in spring, as a wet teabag on its string; by anything glowing, as a hot coal; anything soft or slow, as a cat rising from a chair; anything smooth and dry, as a stone, or warm and glistening; anything sliding, anything sliding back and forth; anything sliding in and out with an oiled surface, as certain machine parts, anything of a certain shape, like the state of Florida; anything pounding, anything stroking; anything bolt upright, anything horizontal and gaping, as a certain sea anemone; anything warm, anything wet, anything wet and red, anything turning red, as the sun at evening; anything wet and pink, anything long and straight with a blunt end, as a pestle; anything coming out of anything else, as a snail from its shell, as a snailÕs horns from its head; anything opening; any stream of water running, any stream running, any stream spurting, any stream spouting; any cry, any soft cry, any grunt; anything going into anything else, as a hand searching in a purse; anything clutching, anything grasping; anything rising, anything tightening or filling, as a sail; anything dripping, anything hardening, anything softening. - Almost No Memory, Lydia Davis PotterÕs Clay Paul Fowler (b. 1978, Wisconsin) PotterÕs Clay was written for the tenth anniversary of the Milwaukee Choral Artists, of which the composerÕs mother is a member. Fowler writes, ÒThis mantra is spoken to Avalokitesvara, the bodhisattva of compassion, who vowed to hear the prayers of all sentient beings and postpone his own enlightenment until every being on earth achieved nirvana. In some renderings of AvalokitesvaraÕs story, Amitabha Buddha endows him with eleven heads and one thousand arms, so he may better hear and assist those who suffer. His mantra manifests compassion, good fortune, and purifies negative karma. In this piece the mantra is primarily intoned on a, b, and d [mirroring the three sounds of Om]. The turning point of the piece is generated by the simultaneous use of the mantra in the keys of both d and e. The mantra in e acts like the outside fear element that often imposes upon pure mind, speech, and body and the result of this is a question that is frequently our greatest downfall: WhatÕs the future?Ó [Om Mani PadmŽ Hum] Life is like a potterÕs clay Changing from day to day. As stars sparkle in the sky Light and dark go quickly by. WhatÕs the future, no one knows, So be at peace With how life goes. -Tibetan Tales for Little Buddhas, Naomi C. Rose evening morning day David Lang The composer writes: ÒI wanted to make a piece about the creation story but I didn't want to highlight one religion's or culture's narrative over another. It was important for me to try to find something universal, something present in all stories, or common to all cultures. I hit upon the idea of making a kind of checklist of everything that needed to be created to get the world to this point, without each individual culture's stories or myths or exoticisms. I went back to the first chapter of Genesis, to see what I could get out of my own culture's story, and I stripped away all the descriptions, adjectives, connectors and motivators. All that is left of Genesis in my text are the nouns, leaving a dispassionate list of everything created, in the order in which it is mentioned.Êevening morning day was commissioned by the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, Dianne Berkun, Director.Ó heaven earth earth darkness deep waters light light light light darkness light day darkness night evening morning day firmament waters waters waters firmament waters firmament waters firmament firmament heaven evening morning day waters heaven place land land earth waters seas earth grass herb seed fruit-tree fruit seed earth earth grass herb seed tree fruit seed evening morning day lights firmament heaven day night signs seasons days years lights firmament heaven light earth lights light day light night stars firmament heaven light earth day night light darkness evening morning day waters creatures birds earth firmament heaven sea-monsters creature waters birds waters seas birds earth evening morning day earth creatures cattle things beasts earth beasts earth cattle every-creeping-thing man image likeness dominion fish sea birds air cattle earth every-creeping-thing man image image male female earth dominion fish sea, birds air earth every-creeping-thing herb seed earth tree fruit tree seed beast earth bird air earth every-creeping-thing life herb every-thing evening morning day - David Lang, after Genesis 1 Statements Pelle Gudmundsen-Holmgreen (b. 1932, Denmark) Statements is based on three poems of Hans-J¿rgen Nielsen. Here we hear a certain unique minimalism, reflective of the New Simplicity of which Gudmundsen-Holmgreen was a leader, that entered our musical language in the late sixties in an attempt to remove complexity from music and create a sound world from a very few compositional elements Ð in this case, a few words, connected by an article or conjunction, each assigned to one of six notes. The composer writes, with a few words Ð"morning, a face, a coast, an eye, a haze and jump" Ð the poet sketches out "a situation of a classical type, the elements of a play with the unities of time, place and action. Then he runs this ruthlessly through his system, a repetitive structure ... [which] by virtue of its rhythm and sonority gradually brings about a new expressiveness.Ó Gudmundsen-Holmgreen mirrors this perfectly in the music, which also takes on a unique and somewhat jarring expressivity as the texture moves from one line to seven and back to two. Of his life and work, Gudmundsen-Holmgreen says: ÒI take after my father [a sculptor], nothing odd about that. Apart from the interest in space and texture, I have inherited his sensitivity and kept his childish and na•ve outlook to my work. In my opinion this is one of the cardinal virtues. Even if life can weigh heavily, where experience peels the spontaneity away, for most people there is a little reservoir of innocence at the bottom of their soul. I believe that I, through my music, have managed to retain a certain childish delight. And I have also inherited from my father the quest for the perfect form. I know that it canÕt be found, but I shall continue to try. I think that there is in each work a meaning, a dream, that the layers can be peeled away to reveal.Ó Epic text: i. morning a face a coast ii. jump a morning a face iii. haze a jump a morning iv. eye a haze a jump v. coast an eye a haze xi. face a coast an eye Statements: i. it is and it is enough ii. I make statements and that is all. - Hans-J¿rgen Nielsen, trans. by the composer Echoes Paul Fowler Echoes was written for The Crossing and premiered at the January 2010 concert which inspired this recording. The composer writes, ÒThe poetry of Echoes is from Naomi Rose's children's book on Tibetan themes, Pema's Goodnight. The poem aligns nature's transformation at nightfall with the echoing of the famous mantra from the Heart Sutra, gatŽ gatŽ paragatŽ parasamgatŽ bhodi svaha. In chanting this mantra, a practitioner explores emptiness as the gateway to compassion Ð gone, gone, beyond gone, beyond completely gone, enlightenment, so be it. This piece was inspired by The Crossing's warmth, artistry, and otherworldly sound; it is offered as a gift.Ó Snow peaks turn golden. Fragrant petals. Butterflies. The crimson skies melt into night. Silver stars and sailing moon. Echoes of a chanting tune. GatŽ gatŽ paragatŽ parasamgatŽ bhodi svaha. -PemaÕs Goodnight, Naomi C. Rose I want to live David Lang I want to live was originally a movement in a 70-minute collaborative work by the three composers who began Bang on a Can: Michael Gordon, Julia Wolfe, and Lang. Gordon writes: ÒIn classical music, it is quite unusual for composers to collaborate, but it wasn't like that among Flemish Renaissance painters Ð if the painter in the studio next door did better angels and you painted better flowers, it wasn't unusual for a collaboration to ensue. In my case, however, the requests for collaboration have often come from others, and Julia Wolfe, David Lang and I found ourselves embarking on our third collaborative piece in 2004, courtesy of the Cologne-based musikFabrik ensemble and the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Next Wave Festival. We reunited with Deborah Artman, who had written the libretto for Lost Objects. Like Lost Objects, Shelter is a staged oratorio, but with smaller forces: three sopranos and a large mixed ensemble.Ó I want to live is for the three sopranos alone; combined with LangÕs compositional language, the result is music that is raw, immediate, and mesmerizing. I want to live where you live. - Deborah Artman We thank the following for generously contributing to the making of this recording: The composers: William Brooks, Paul Fowler, and David Lang; Naomi C. Rose texts used by kind permission of the author. David Lang and Lydia Davis texts used by kind permission of David Lang. The CrossingÕs Artistic and Community Boards of Directors: James Anderson, Maren Montalbano Brehm (General Manager), Beryl B. Byles, Colin Dill, Jeff Dinsmore (President), Steven Gearhart (Personnel Manager), Cynthia A. Jarvis, Michael Meloy, Esq., Donald Nally, Rebecca Siler (Treasurer), V. Chapman Smith, M. Kathryn Taylor, Rebecca Thornburgh, Beth Van de Water; The Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill, our home: Reverend Cynthia Jarvis, Church Administrator Jo Ann West, and Organist Ken Lovett; St. PaulÕs Episcopal Church, Chestnut Hill: The Rev. E. Clifford Cutler, Music Director Zachary Hemenway, Music Assistant Karen Richter, and Administrative Assistant Virginia Emlen. This recording was also made possible in part by The Musical Fund Society of Philadelphia. The recording of Six Mediaeval Lyrics was supported in part by a grant from the Research Committee of the Music Department, University of York. Produced and recorded by Paul Vazquez, Digital Mission Online. Recorded June 29-July 2, 2011 at St. PaulÕs Episcopal Church, Chestnut Hill.