Dreams of Longing (2010)
Dreams of Longing (2010)
A Songbook of settings of Robert S. Fowler
22′
Bar, Pno
Commissioned by Bob Fowler for his wife, Penny
Dreams of Longing (2010) (pdf)
PROGRAMME NOTE
Dreams of Longing was commissioned by the poet Bob Fowler for his wife, Penny. I had set some of Bob’s poems the year before and the idea of a larger setting of his work was mooted soon after. The work was commissioned for his son, Hal, to possibly sing – coming from a background in musical theatre this had some bearing on Dreams of Longing and the soundworld it inhabits. The piece sets eight poems of Bob’s, seven taken from his 2009 collection Private Verses, and begins and ends with the first and final poems from the collection.
The songs themselves are slightly lighter and more ‘popular’ then much of my work (especially works in a similar medium) and it is because of this that the work is subtitled a ‘songbook’ rather than a song-cycle. I liked the idea of a collection of songs and that each could be taken individually, or a handful of songs, and have merit rather than a journey taking place across the work as a whole. That being said, the first and final songs share similar material and all the songs are based upon the same harmonic mode, melodic fragments and gestures – so a performance of the work as a whole would work equally well.
Bob’s poems span his whole creative life and deal with many emotions, moods and seasons. Despite the array of subject matter they are all concerned with the same preoccupation – the relationship between husband and wife – and this idea of every disparate event being a reflection of the same overriding emotion greatly appealed to me. It is because of this that a harmonic and musical journey takes place, but we end back at the same place, the place where the poet feels most happy and most loved.
PAC