Liederabend LII: Art Songs and Spirituals by African American Composers
NEC faculty members Tanya Blaich, Damien Francoeur-Krzyzek, and Cameron Stowe present NEC graduate students from the departments of collaborative piano and voice in an evening of song.
The Liederabend—literally, "evening of song"—dates back to the 1800s, when musicians and lovers of music would gather at someone's home, and one or more singers and a pianist would perform the songs of composers of the day. In the field of classical music, these songs are referred to as "art songs," and the German art songs are called "Lieder." In Germany, the great age of song came in the 19th century. German and Austrian composers had written music for voice with keyboard before this time, but it was with the flowering of German literature in the Classical and Romantic eras that composers found high inspiration in great poetry, sparking the genre known as the "Lied."
The tradition of the art song composition continues today, with composers from all corners of the world setting poetry in many languages, scored for voice and piano. The NEC Liederabend series presents songs in a variety of languages—not only German—dating from the 19th century up to the present day.
ABOUT SONG LAB:
This Liederabend performance is connected to NEC's Song Lab, a new model of training for singers and pianists based around the performance and study of art song. This spring, Song Lab focuses on American art song repertoire, including the history and culture surrounding it, and this Liederabend is performed as an extension of this area of study.
WATCH CONCERT STREAM:
Jacqueline Hairston, arr. | Guide My Feet
Guide my feet, Lord,
While I run this race.
Guide my feet, Lord,
While I run this race.
Guide my feet, Lord,
While I run this race, for I don’t want to run this race in vain.
Hold my hand, Lord,
While I run this race.
Hold my hand, Lord,
While I run this race.
Hold my hand, Lord,
While I run this race, for I don’t want to run this race in vain.
Stan’ by me, Lord, while I run this race,
Stan’ by’m me my Lord;
While I run this race, for I don’t want to run this race in vain.
African American Spiritual
Artists- Daon Drisdom, tenor
- Thomas Burrill, piano
Hale Smith | March Moon, from Beyond the Rim of Day (poem by Langston Hughes)
March Moon
The moon is naked.
The wind has undressed the moon.
The wind has blown all the cloud-garments
Off the body of the moon
And now she's naked,
Stark naked.
But why don't you blush,
O shameless moon?
Don't you know
It isn't nice to be naked?
Langston Hughes
Florence B. Price | Songs to the Dark Virgin (poem by Langston Hughes)
I.
Would
That I were a jewel,
A shattered jewel,
That all my shining brilliants
Might fall at thy feet,
Thou dark one.
II.
Would
That I were a garment,
A shimmering, silken garment,
That all my folds
Might wrap about thy body,
Absorb thy body,
Hold and hide thy body,
Thou dark one.
III.
Would
That I were a flame,
But one sharp, leaping flame
To annihilate thy body,Z
Thou dark one.
Langston HughesArtists- Anthony León, tenor
- Miles Fellenberg, piano
Camille Nickerson, arr. | from Five Creole Songs
Chère, mo lemmé toi
Michieu Banjo
Lizette, ma chère amieChère, mo lemmé toi is a popular Creole song often sung on Mardi Gras, the last day of the Carnival season, when a masked suitor can confess his true feelings to his beloved, “I love you like a pig loves mud!"
Michieu Banjo is a Creole folk song that describes Mister Banjo, the town Dandy who incites envy in those who do not have his musical talent or his fine clothes….Slick styled hair, a red necktie, a flower in his buttonhole, and shoes so new that they squeak!
Lizette, ma chêre amie: When the beautiful servant Lizette is sent away from the plantation to work in the city, her lover mourns his loss and worries about the dangers she may encounter without his protection.
Artists- Emma Robertson, soprano
- Marie-Elise Boyer, piano
Robert Owens | from Rimbaud Cabaret
I. Le dormeur du val
II. Rêvé pour l'hiverLe dormeur du val
C'est un trou de verdure où chante une rivière
Accrochant follement aux herbes des haillons
D'argent ; où le soleil, de la montagne fière,
Luit: c'est un petit val qui mousse de rayons.
Un soldat jeune, lèvre bouche ouverte, tête nue,
Et la nuque baignant dans le frais cresson bleu,
Dort; il est étendu dans l'herbe sous la nue,
Pâle dans son lit vert où la lumière pleut.
Les pieds dans les glaïeuls, il dort. Souriant comme
Sourirait un enfant malade, il fait un somme :
Nature, berce-le chaudement : il a froid.
Les parfums ne font pas frissonner sa narine ;
Il dort dans le soleil, la main sur sa poitrine
Tranquille. Il a deux trous rouges au côté droit.
Arthur Rimbaud
Rêvé pour l’hiver
L'hiver, nous irons dans un petit wagon rose
Avec des coussins bleus.
Nous serons bien. Un nid de baisers fous repose
Dans chaque coin moelleux.
Tu fermeras l'oeil, pour ne point voir, par la glace,
Grimacer les ombres des soirs,
Ces monstruosités hargneuses, populace
De démons noirs et de loups noirs.
Puis tu te sentiras la joue égratignée...
Un petit baiser, comme une folle araignée,
Te courra par le cou
Et tu me diras: "Cherche!" en inclinant la tête
- Et nous prendrons du temps à trouver cette bête
- Qui voyage beaucoupArthur Rimbaud
The Sleeper in the Valley
It is a green hollow where a stream gurgles,
Crazily catching silver rags of itself on the grasses;
Where the sun shines from the proud mountain:
It is a little valley bubbling over with light.
A young soldier, open-mouthed, bare-headed,
With the nape of his neck bathed in cool blue cresses,
Sleeps; he is stretched out on the grass, under the sky,
Pale on his green bed where the light falls like rain.
His feet in the yellow flags, he lies sleeping. Smiling as a sick child might smile, he is having a nap:
Cradle him warmly, Nature: he is cold.
No odour makes his nostrils quiver;
He sleeps in the sun, his hand on his breast
At peace. There are two red holes in his right side.
Translation by Oliver Bernard: Arthur Rimbaud, Collected Poems (1962) from the site Arthur Rimbaud – Mag4.net: Biography and poetry, www.mag4.net/Rimbaud
Dreamed for Winter
In the winter, we shall travel in a little pink railway carriage
With blue cushions.
We shall be comfortable. A nest of mad kisses lies in wait
In each soft corner.
You will close your eyes, so as not to see, through the glass,
The evening shadows pulling faces.
Those snarling monsters, a population
Of black devils and black wolves.
Then you'll feel your cheek scratched...
A little kiss, like a crazy spider,
Will run round your neck...
And you'll say to me : "Find it !" bending your head
- And we'll take a long time to find that creature
- Which travels a lot...Translation by Oliver Bernard: Arthur Rimbaud, Collected Poems (1962) from the site Arthur Rimbaud – Mag4.net: Biography and poetry, www.mag4.net/Rimbaud
Thomas Kerr, arr. | Git on Board
Oh, git on board,
Lil chillun git on board
Lil chillun,
Git on board
Lil chillun dere’s room for many a more.
De gospel train’s a-comin’
I hear it close at hand,
I hear de car wheels movin’ and rumblin’ through de lan’
Git on board,
Lil chillun git on board
Lil chillun,
Git on board
Lil chillun dere’s room for many a more.
African American Spiritual
Artists- Lucas Ludwig Coura, countertenor
- Gayoung Park, piano
Harry Thacker Burleigh | The Grey Wolf (poem by Arthur Symons)
The grey wolf comes again: I had made fast
The door with chains; how has the grey wolf passed
My threshold? I have nothing left to give:
Go from me now, grey wolf, and let me live!
I have fed you once, given all you would, given all
I had to give, I have been prodigal;
I am poor now, the table is but spread
With water and a little wheaten bread;
You have taken all I ever had from me:
Go from me now, grey wolf, and let me be!
The grey wolf, crouching by the bolted door,
Waits, watching for his food upon the floor;
I see the old hunger and the old thirst for blood
Rise up, under his eye-balls, like a flood:
What shall I do that the grey wolf may go?
This time, I have no store of meat to throw;
He waits; but I have nothing left, and I stand
Helpless, and his eyes fasten on my hand.
O grey wolf, grey wolf, will you not depart,
Unless I feed you with my heart?
Arthur Symons
Richard Thompson | Love's Apotheosis, from the Shadow of Dawn: Five Poems by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Love me. I care not what the circling years
To me may do.
If, but in spite of time and tears,
You prove but true.
Love me -- albeit grief shall dim mine eyes,
And tears bedew,
I shall not e'en complain, for then my skies
Shall still be blue.
Love me, and though the winter snow shall pile,
And leave me chill,
Thy passion's warmth shall make for me, meanwhile,
A sun-kissed hill.
And when the days have lengthened into years,
And I grow old,
Oh, spite of pains and griefs and cares and fears,
Grow thou not cold.
Then hand and hand we shall pass up the hill,
I say not down;
That twain go up, of love, who've loved their fill, --
To gain love's crown.
Love me, and let my life take up thine own,
As sun the dew.
Come, sit, my queen, for in my heart a throne
Awaits for you!
Paul Laurence DunbarArtists- Elaine Daiber, soprano
- Hanzheng Li, piano
Hall Johnson, arr. | I Got to Lie Down
I got to lie down,
How shall I rise?
Got to lie down,
How shall I rise?
I got to lie down,
How shall I rise,
‘Pear befo’ de jedgmen’ bar?
Dark was der night an’ col’ der groun’
On which my Lord was laid,
Great drops of sweat like blood ran down,
In agony He prayed.
I got to lie down,
How shall I rise?...
Dear Father, remove dis bitter cup
If such Dy sacred will,
If not, content I’ll drink it up,
Dy pleasure I’ll fulfill.
I got to lie down,
How shall I rise? …
I would not live a sinner’s life,
I’ll tell you de reason why,
I’m scared my Lord might call on me
An’ I wouldn’ be ready to die.
Dey’ll wrap me in white linen,
An’ dat’s gon’ter hol’ me fas;
Dey’ll lay me in my silent tomb
An’ dat’s gon’ be my las’!
I got to lie down,
How shall I rise? …
I got to lie down,
Oh,
How shall I rise?
Oh,
‘Pear befo’ de jedgmen’ bar?
I got to ‘pear befo’ de jedgement de jedgement bar!African American Spiritual
H. Leslie Adams | Creole Girl, from Nightsongs
When you dance, do you think of Spain,
Purple skirts and clipping castanets,
Creole Girl?
When you laugh, do you think of France,
Golden wine and mincing minuets,
Creole Girl?
When you sing, do you think of young America,
Grey guns and battling bayonets?
When you cry, do you think of Africa,
Blue nights and casual canzonets?
When you dance, do you think of Spain,
Purple skirts and clipping castanets,
Creole Girl?
Leslie Morgan Collins
Artists- Daon Drisdom, tenor
- Thomas Burrill, piano
Florence B. Price | Night (poem by Louise C. Wallace)
Night comes, a Madonna clad in scented blue.
Rose red her mouth and deep her eyes,
She lights her stars, and turns to where,
Beneath her silver lamp the moon,
Upon a couch of shadow lies
A dreamy child,
The wearied Day.
Louise C. Wallace
Jacqueline Hairston, arr. | Lord I'll Go
Lord I’ll go.
Lord I’ll go!
If the Lord wants somebody
Here am I
O Lord, send me.
Send me!
Lord I’ll go.
Lord I’ll go!
If the Lord wants somebody
Here am I
O Lord, send me.
Send me.
Lord, I’ll go!
Lord, I’ll go!
Lord, I’ll go!
Oh, I’ll go!
African American SpiritualArtists- Zabriel Rivers, countertenor
- Marie-Elise Boyer, piano
Undine Smith Moore, arr. | Come Down Angels
Come down, Angels, a trouble the water.
Let God's saints come in.
I love to shout I love to sing
Let God's saints come in.
I love to praise my heavenly King,
Let God's saints come in.
I think I hear the Sinner say
Let God's saints come in.
My Savior taught me how to pray
Let God's saints come in.
Come down, Angels, trouble the water.
Let God's saints come in.
Down, down, down, down trouble the water,
Let God's saints come in.
African American Spiritual
Artists- Emma Robertson, soprano
- Marie-Elise Boyer, piano
Damien Sneed, arr. | All Night, All Day
All night, all day.
Angels watching over me, my Lord.
All night, all day.
Angels watching over me.
All night, all day.
Oh, Angels watching over me, my Lord.
All night, all day.
Angels watching over me.
All night, all day.
Angels watching over me, my Lord.
All night, all day.
Angels watching over me.
African American SpiritualArtists- Anthony León, tenor
- Miles Fellenberg, piano