Names

Names comes from a cycle of 11 a cappella choral pieces derived from “Early Moon,” a collection of poetry by Carl Sandberg. The images in these simple, direct lyrics have a depth and resonance that all but cry out for musical expression: the swing of time slows down into “an evening waterfall of sleepy sounds;” a balloon-seller turns a world of “wishing children” into spring; the whistle of a fog-bound boat calls and cries like a lost child “hunting the harbor’s breast and the harbor’s eyes;” dive-buzzing bugs choose appropriately colored flowers for their “summer bungalows;” rodents riddle you why “the grave of a rat is no deeper than the grave of a man.”

In the cycle, many different compositional techniques are employed: diatonicism, atonality, pure sound…whatever is required by the varied imagery of each poem. And while sometimes technically complex, the emphasis is always—as in the poems themselves—on a forthright, almost child-like directness of expression.

Names is the first piece in the cycle, and it simply—like a small child—names things; names them with a growing awareness of their generality, and their unity. A horse is more than an individual horse; fish, birds, men, women, children: they are, all of them, something larger than they seem; “and they are named All God’s children.”

—Russell Horton