Hymne au Soleil

First critical edition. Together with Debussy, Ravel, and Dukas, Lili Boulanger was one of the most important representatives of impressionism. Despite her short life of just 24 years, she developed a distinctive personal style, and composed a huge variety of works including songs, piano music, operatic scenes, and choral music, all with great inventiveness. The Hymne au soleil (Hymn to the sun) for mixed choir, alto solo, and piano, was written in 1912 to a poem by Casimir Delavigne. In ecstatic layers of chords the sun is acclaimed; through its power it brings the colors of the earth to light anew. The edition contains both the original French text, with a singable English translation underlaid.