Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking
This composition has been a labor of love over the last twenty years or so. I eventually hope to create a larger work based on four poems by Walt Whitman — to my mind the supreme American bard — but it is a slow process if I am to do honor to the beauty of his words. Here is the first section of the first section of his powerful seascape, in which he begins to describe how he learned the art of poetry from the bird-muses and the wise refrain of the ocean on the Long Island shore, whispering the ultimate word.
(Updated 11/2021)
Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG
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9 comments:
Tobias, the composition is beautiful. I hear "play of shadows, twining and twisting as if they were alive", and the sad chanting of the he-bird, and the dirge for the she-bird. The music gave me chills.
Oh, and it's a perfect accompaniment for my day of the blues. My friend Margaret tells me it's the full moon and that I need to go out and howl at the moon tonight, and I'll feel better. I don't know. Sometimes I think that it's best to just have a day of the blues.
Tobias, Thank you for adding this beautiful composition to your blog. It is a real blessing on what is otherwise a very dreary day.
The sun shines here on the west coast, but I see your shoreline, Tobias.
Beautiful. Yes, Mimi named it. Thank you for sharing this, Tobias.
Tobias
Thank you for this. It was great to see in Chicago albeit briefly. Send my regards to James during the transition at 815.
Walter+
This is extraordinary!!!! I'm listening to it a second time as I type this.
You've managed to capture, I think, the quality of Whitman's run-on sentences, especially with the violins in the background... so that the "musical sentences" have this endless quality to them, building and twisting, at times lyrical, at times discordant or even ominous or playful. Whitman jams so much of life into his poetry. And you've got that going on in your symphony here. I honestly hadn't expected a symphony, but what else could do him justice?
As a child I discovered Leaves of Grass in the attic (where my brother and I slept). And I recall reading his poems out loud to myself, relishing the long sentences, the music of them. Sometimes a child is lucky when they run out of library books!
Thank you for this treat! And the recollections of my childhood discovery of Whitman.
Tobias, this brings the Chesapeake Bay to mind. Thank you , this is both interesting and lovely.
Walt Whitman — to my mind the supreme American bard
Indeed! :-)
Downloading now...
Thanks for all the kind comments. Some day I will take up work on this again and move on to the next stanza!
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