Rains, Pours

I’ve written seven choral pieces over the years that–like everything I’d ever finished before Lysistrata–were procrastinated over, then rushed, then late, performed, then consigned to the to-be-perfected-one-day file.  So were three of the four pieces on my orchestral record;  so, when I started revising those scores, I looked at the choral manuscripts and thought, either light a match and be done with it, or stop wincing and start engraving.   It was quite laborious, as the original of one  twelve-minute double-choir piece was 94 pages long–don’t ask–but at length it was complete; and, while I was at it, I also revised Avow, my twelve-minute opera for Eos–also rushed, also late–which had closed their Six Ten-Minute Operas concert in 1999 but hadn’t been heard in public since.   What’s curious is that–just as I was wondering how to get the word out about them (the pieces aren’t yet published, though as of two weeks ago–hooray!–they will be, by Schirmer)–four conductors (and a composer) materialized to support the work.  Krista Lang Blackwood, who–after an ebullient Jo in Kansas City ten years—got her doctorate and started Octarium, recorded Pied Beauty this month ; Christopher Clowdus, of Empire City Men’s Chorus, leads The Poet Speaks of Praising next month;  Gregg Smith and the Gregg Smith Singers give two Hopkins settings, Pied Beauty and God’s Grandeur, in January; Tobias Picker has programmed Avow with piano for his “Italian-American Composers” concert  for DiCapo in March; and, climactically, Harold Rosenbaum  and his New York Virtuoso Singers perform (in April) and record (in September) the largest scores–Matewan Music, Cantate Domino, and The Poet Speaks of Praising.

Obviously I’m delighted with the performances—what composer isn’t?–but the sweetest part of all of it is letting go of the “had I only.”  Out they go, into the world!   Meanwhile, back to The New Testament: Draft Two.