Secular
Lauer, Elizabeth
Fear No More…
(text by William Shakespeare)
for double mixed chorus a cappella
A recording is featured on Spotify.
Sigh No More, Ladies
(text by William Shakespeare)
for three part treble chorus a cappella
McKay, Francis Thompson
River Time (text by William Styron)
Munn, Zae
Memorial
A positive reflection on the connectedness between the living and the dead. Memorial (1992) is based on texts from a short story by Ann Kilkelly which tells of a parade to a cemetery where a child recites In Flander’s Field. A woman remembers reciting the same poem years ago, at the end of which all present feel the connection of the living to the dead.
Van Appledorn, Mary Jeanne
Two Shakespeare Songs:
Under the Greenwood Tree
Blow, Blow Thou Winter Wind
Stylistically crisp and rapidly projected, this double feature exemplifies the choral trends of the Eisenhower years.
Vercoe, Elizabeth
Irreveries from Sappho
SSA and piano
“Hugely funny, elegant” (St. Louis Dispatch)
Titles: Andromeda Rag, Older Woman Blues, & Boogie for Leda.
Irreveries from Sappho, for women’s chorus, is an arrangement of one of the composer’s six song cycles on texts by women. The piece is wickedly satiric and full of musical jokes and parodies. The composer comments: “Although Sappho’s poetry is over 2500 years old, it seems remarkably up-to-date. Its wit calls for whatever musical sleight of hand a composer might muster: thus, the use of popular idioms and hidden tunes (Turkey in the Straw, Auld Lang Syne), as well as the more respectable tricks of the trade, such as counterpoint and recitative. Sappho’s three women have clearly distinctive voices, but all three bespeak a fierce pride.”
The score of Irreveries is available from the American Composers Alliance.