Flood, for two-part treble chorus and piano (2008)
Duration: 4’
MP3 Player
Score excerpt
Commissioned by:
Treble Singers of the Fairfax Choral Society, Fairfax, VA; Caroline Crocker, conductor
Premiere:
Treble Singers of the Fairfax Choral Society, Fairfax, VA; Caroline Crocker, conductor
Annandale United Methodist Church, Annandale, VA
March 13, 2008
Performers in audio recording:
Recording from premiere
Text:
Hithem Shaw, 4th grader at Daniels Run Elementary School, Fairfax, VA (2008)
Rain… Rain…
Rain is falling, falling, falling
Rain is falling over topDrip, drop, drip, drop
Water level going up
Streets flooding
Water flowing
People runningDrip, drop, drip, drop
Water flowing into houses
Over cars and over roofs
People floating on the surfaceDrip, drop, drip, drop
Rain is falling, falling, falling
Rain is falling over top.
Program Notes:
Flood was commissioned by conductor Caroline Crocker (née Desmond) and the Treble Singers of the Fairfax Choral Society under the auspices of the FCS’s Fourth Annual Poetry of Music Fine Arts Project, 2008. I was asked to select one of dozens of original poems written by Daniels Run Elementary School’s fourth-grade students and to set it to music. I selected Hithem Shaw’s affecting poem “Flood.” In my setting, I used the highest register of the piano keyboard and nearly continuous sixteenth and 32nd notes to evoke the sound of a constant rain shower, which only truly clears at the end of the work. I also used traditional word-painting techniques to depict the ascending “water level going up” lines and descending “drip, drop” lines.
This work was commissioned by and is dedicated to Maestra Caroline Crocker and the Youth Choruses of the Fairfax Choral Society.
— January 2008