POEMS & PRAYER for 16 voices, 2 pianos and 4 percussion players (2023)

BUY score & parts

I. Dreams :7' 55 II. The Doubter and the Doubt : 7' 40 III. Pachamama : 8' Total duration: approx. 23' 35"

español

Poems & Prayers was commissioned by Robert Van Sice

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premiere: 13th of October, 2023 at the Sprague Memorial Hall, New Haven, USA, performed by The Yale Choral Artist and The Percussion Collective, conducted by Jeffrey Douma

Programme notes The texts of the three movements of this work are concerned with our relationship to each other, to ourselves and to the environment, in this order. The 1st movement 'Dreams' is based on selected lines from Walt Whitman's 'Song of Myself' and from the tile of his poem “I Dreamed in a Dream”. Whitman's text describes the kind of relationship he envisages between human beings both at the social and personal level. But he states that if his view is not “yours as much as mine, then "it is nothing or next to nothing”. In a world as divided as ours is today, this perspective seems to me specially relevant. The text of the 2nd movement 'The Doubter and the Doubt' consists of stanzas I selected from the poem “Brahma” by Ralph Waldo Emerson. His view in this poem is that human beings can perfect themselves morally and spiritually by going beyond the permanent binary oppositions that plague the human mind, that is, the idea that everything must be reduced to thinking in terms of either 'this' or 'that'. The 3rd movement deals with our dysfunctional relationship with the environment (Mother Earth) which currently poses an existential threat to our species. The indigenous people of the Americas, have traditionally considered Mother Earth an entity which makes possible and sustains life. A widely given name to Mother Earth is Pachamama. The text of this movement is written by myself. I have structured it in the form of a prayer to Pachamama. I chose the prayer format taking into account the following: when we pray, the only person we can be sure is listening is ourselves. If we are asking for change, we are the ones best placed to effect such change. This is specially apparent if we ask Pachamama to protect us and the environment. Since we are the ones damaging the environment, we are the ones who can stop doing so. Praying to Pachamama to save us and the environmental is no different than asking ourselves to protect us from ourselves. Form this perspective, I see praying primarily as a commitment to change. The text of this movement seeks to express the emotions that come with this realization. A.V. London June 2023

the texts: I. Dreams "dreams, dreams… I dreamed in a dream that my thoughts were the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands. I am of old and young, of the foolish as much as the wise, regardless of others, ever regardful of others, maternal as well as paternal, a child as well as a man, stuff'd with the stuff that is coarse and stuff'd with the stuff that is fine, one of the nation of many nations, the smallest the same and the largest the same, I resist any thing better than my own diversity, breathe the air but leave plenty after me, and am not stuck up, and am in my place. These are the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands, If they are not yours as much as mine they are nothing, or next to nothing, if they are not the riddle and the untying of the riddle they are nothing, or next to nothing if they are not just as close as they are distant they are nothing, or next to nothing”

III. “Pachamama” (a prayer to mother earth) Sálvanos, (“save us” in Spanish) save us, Oh! Pacha, Pacha, Pacha, Pacha - ma - ma Pacha, Pacha, Pacha, Pachamama. Pachamama save us, heal that which we destroy, Pachamama wake me up, wake them up, wake us up from our slumber. Pachamama save us from ourselves, sálvanos. So far, so wide may this prayer travel. Far and beyond may this prayer be heard so bright and loud. Heal that which we destroy, may we hear your voice your call telling us to stop. Shake us Pachamama. Protect us and give us the strength to change prayers are only words arranged to say what we must, Pachamama save us from ourselves sálvanos, libérame (“fee me” both in Spanish & Latin) protect us from them de mi ( “from myself” in Spanish) from you from all of us from me, from him, from you, from them from ourselves. Pacha Pacha Pacha Pa ! sálvanos, save us Pachamama !

I. The Doubter and The Doubt Far or forgot to me is near; Shadow and sunlight are the same; And one to me are shame and fame. When me they fly, I am the wings; I am the doubter and the doubt, I am the hymn (song) the Brahmin sings.