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- Judith Weir
On the Palmy Beach (2019)
- Chester Music Ltd (World)
Commissioned by Kings Place, and first performed there on 24th October 2019 by Ruby Hughes (soprano), Natalie Clein (cello) and Julius Drake (piano)
- pf/vc
- Soprano
- 13 min
- Wallace Stevens; Kathleen Jamie; Norman MacCaig; Emily Dickinson
- English
Programme Note
On the Palmy Beach comprises four idiosyncratic views of life in the sea and on the beach. ‘Fabliau of Florida’ (Wallace Stevens) is a complex sea view with powerful, ever-changing textures. ‘The Glass-hulled Boat’ (Kathleen Jamie) reveals a phantasmagorical jellyfish, represented musically by the cello. ‘Basking Shark’ (Norman McCaig) relates another personal encounter with a sea-creature, provoking reflections about pre-history and evolution. ‘I started Early – Took my Dog’ (Emily Dickinson) is a gripping account of the waves on a beach, and their almost sexual pursuit of the poet (who, it is thought, never actually saw the sea in her lifetime.)
Programme note © 2019 Judith Weir
Programme note © 2019 Judith Weir
Scores
Reviews
Voluptuous and witty, salty and bracing, with a delicious personification of a jellyfish, this short song cycle should go straight into the repertoire.
2nd November 2019
...a quietly quixotic setting of poems by Wallace Stevens and Emily Dickinson, among others, all with marine resonances and inspiring a tasteful and touching response from this most inventive of composers.
25th October 2019