• Iain Bell
  • A Cradle Suite vol. II (2010)

  • Chester Music Ltd (World)
  • piano
  • Mezzo Soprano, Soprano
  • 9 min
  • Eugene Fields

Programme Note

The Lullaby is traditionally the simplest of song forms, often belying the sinister nature of the text. Themes of night, fear and death are ever-present married with the escapism sought through sleep and dreams. The nineteenth century American poet Eugene Field captures this atmosphere in his many forays into the genre.

Volume One sets his ‘Japanese Lullaby’ with its delicate, contemplative tone alongside the ‘Norse Lullaby’ painted in far the grander, elemental strokes of the Viking lands. Volume Two, scored as a duet evokes fairies, the Mirkland Queen, brownies and trolls in its lullabies of Old England, the Orkney Isles and Cornwall.

Selections of this piece were premiered at Wigmore Hall in 2012.