Welcome!

It is my great pleasure to welcome you all to Resound Ensemble’s spring concert, Sure on This Shining Night! In addition to the title song by Morten Lauridsen, tonight’s concert features some of my personal favorite choral works by composers Samuel Barber, Benjamin Britten, and Eric Whitacre. I am also thrilled to be able to revisit some favorite pieces I have performed with Resound in years past, including "The Sounding Sea," “Luminescence," and "Cells Planets."

I am so grateful to the members of Resound Ensemble for our wonderful artistic collaborations over the past six years I have been Artistic Director. Many thanks to those members who have served as Section Leaders: Fiona Friedland, Arathi Govind, Caia Brookes, David Ahn (also our outstanding Chorus Manager), Peter Vaughan-Vail, and Fred Fishman. I am ever grateful to my colleague and friend, the amazingly talented Lynden Bair, for his effortless accompanying skills at the piano. I am especially appreciative of the support and leadership of the Resound Board Chairs with whom I have had the pleasure of working: Anne Cramer, Lindsey Clopp, Nina Dessart, and Kristen Schultz Oliver.

Finally, a huge round of thanks to all of you, our devoted audience members! Thank you for continuing to support Resound Ensemble by attending our concerts and donating to our organization. I hope you will join me in wishing Resound Ensemble many exciting and successful future concert seasons!

Resound Singers

Artistic Director

Ben Riggs, DMA

Accompanist

Lynden Bair

ACKNowledgements

Resound wishes to give special thanks to the following people/donors who provide the support required to make our organization run and produce our concerts:

Production Volunteers

volunteer Board of Directors

Kristen Schultz Oliver, Board Chair
Victoria Lee, Secretary
Jeff Johnson, Interim Treasurer
Members at Large:
David Ahn
Maeve Barton
Lindsey Clopp
Fiona Friedland
Elaine Robertson

Donors

Special Acknowledgement and Thank You

Resound would like to extend our heartfelt appreciation to Ben Riggs, who has served as our artistic director for the past six years. Ben's collaborative approach, infectious sense of fun, and thoughtful guidance have been instrumental in shaping our concert programs.

Throughout the challenges of the pandemic, Ben's generous leadership was a beacon of strength and resilience. His creative solutions and unwavering dedication kept us united and focused, allowing us to navigate uncertain times with grace and determination.

Ben's passion for the choral arts has not only inspired as a musical community and we are deeply grateful for his tireless efforts, his belief in our collective vision, and his unwavering support.

Thank you, Ben, for being more than just a director, but a mentor, a friend, and a source of inspiration to us all. We are truly fortunate to have had you at the helm of our program.

Thank you Ben!

Lyrics

I.

A Jubilant Song | Norman Dello Joio (1913-2008) | Walt Whitman, poet

Soloist: Annie Vainshtein

O! Listen to a jubilant song!

The joy of our spirit-it is uncaged,
it darts like lightning!
My soul it darts like lightning!

For we sing to the joys of youth,
and the joy of a glad light-beaming day.

Our spirit sings a jubilant song that is to life full of music,
a life full of concord, of music, a life full of harmony.

We sing prophetic joys, of lofty ideals,
We sing a universal love awaking in the hearts of men.

O! to have life, a poem of new joys,
to shout, dance, exult, and leap.
O! to realize space and flying clouds,
O! to realize space, the sun and moon,
O! to be rulers of destiny and of life

Reincarnations | Samuel Barber (1910-1981), James Stephens, poet

I. Mary Hynes

She is the sky of the sun!
She is the dart of love!
She is the love of my heart!
She is a rune!
She is above the women of the race of Eve, as the sun is above the moon!
Lovely and airy the view from the hill that looks down from Ballylea!
But no good sight is good, until you see the blossom of branches walking towards you, airily.

II. Anthony O’Daly

Anthony!
Since your limbs were laid out the stars do not shine!
The fish leap not out in the waves!
On our meadows the dew does not fall in the morn, for O Daly is dead!
Not a flow'r can be born!
Not a word can be said!
Not a tree have a leaf!
On our meadows the dew does not fall in the morn, for O Daly is dead!
Anthony!
After you there is nothing to do!
There is nothing but grief!

III. The Coolin

Come with me, under my coat, and we will drink our fill of the milk of the white goat, or wine if it be thy will.

And we will talk, until talk is a trouble, too, out on the side of the hill; And nothing is left to do, but an eye to look into an eye, and a hand in a hand to slip; and a sigh to answer a sigh; And a lip to find out a lip!

What if the night be black! And the air on the mountain chill! Where all but the fern is still!

Stay with me, under my coat and we will drink our fill of the milk of the white goat, out on the side of the hill!

Sleep | Eric Whitacre (b. 1970), Charles Anthony Silvestri, poet

The evening hangs beneath the moon,
A silver thread on darkened dune.
With closing eyes and resting head
I know that sleep is coming soon.

Upon my pillow, safe in bed,
A thousand pictures fill my head.
I cannot sleep, my mind’s a-flight;
And yet my limbs seem made of lead.

If there are noises in the night,
A frightening shadow, flickering light,
Then I surrender unto sleep,
Where clouds of dream give second sight,
What dreams may come, both dark and deep,
Of flying wings and soaring leap
As I surrender unto sleep.

Hymn to St. Cecilia | Benjamin Britten (1913-1976), W.H. Auden, poet

Soloist: Susie Friedlander-Holm, Maeve Barton, Eric Yu, Arathi Govind (5/11 & 5/13) , Annie Vainshtein (5/10), & Lorenzo Ramsey

I. In a garden shady this holy lady

In a garden shady this holy lady with reverent cadence and subtle psalm,
Like a black swan as death came on poured forth her song in perfect calm:
And by ocean's margin this innocent virgin constructed an organ to enlarge her prayer,
And notes tremendous from her great engine thundered out on the Roman air.
 
Blonde Aphrodite rose up excited, moved to delight by the melody,
White as an orchid she rode quite naked in an oyster shell on top of the sea;
At sounds so entrancing the angels dancing came out of their trance into time again,
And around the wicked in Hell's abysses the huge flame flickered and eased their pain.
 
Blessed Cecilia, appear in visions to all musicians, appear and inspire:
Translated Daughter, come down and startle composing mortals with immortal fire.

II. I cannot grow

I cannot grow;
I have no shadow to run away from, I only play.
 
I cannot err;
There is no creature whom I belong to, whom I could wrong.
 
I am defeat when it knows it can now do nothing by suffering.
 All you lived through, dancing because you no longer need it for any deed.
 
I shall never be Different.
Love me.
 
Blessed Cecilia, appear in visionst o all musicians, appear and inspire:
Translated Daughter, come down and startle composing mortals with immortal fire.

III. O ear whose creatures cannot wish to fall

O ear whose creatures cannot wish to fall, O calm of spaces unafraid of weight,
Where Sorrow is herself, forgetting all the gaucheness of her adolescent state,
Where Hope within the altogether strange from every outworn image is released,
And Dread born whole and normal like a beast into a world of truths that never change:
Restore our fallen day; O re-arrange.
 
O dear white children casual as birds, playing among the ruined languages,
So small beside their large confusing words, so gay against the greater silences
Of dreadful things you did: O hang the head, impetuous child with the tremendous brain,
O weep, child, weep, O weep away the stain, lost innocence who wished your lover dead,
Weep for the lives your wishes never led.
 
O cry created as the bow of sin is drawn across our trembling violin.
O weep, child, weep, O weep away the stain.
O law drummed out by hearts against the still long winter of our intellectual will.
That what has been may never be again.
O flute that throbs with the thanksgiving breath of convalescents on the shores of death.
O bless the freedom that you never chose.
O trumpets that unguarded children blow about the fortress of their inner foe.
O wear your tribulation like a rose.
 
Blessed Cecilia, appear in visions to all musicians, appear and inspire:
Translated Daughter, come down and startle composing mortals with immortal fire.

Intermission

II.

Sing Out, My Soul | Marques L.A. Garrett (b. 1984), William Henry Davies, poet

Sing out, my soul, your songs of joy;
Sing as a happy bird will sing
Beneath a rainbow’s lovely arch
In early spring.

Think not of death…
Strive not for gold… 

Train up your mind to feel content,
What matters then how low your store?
What we enjoy, and not possess,
Makes rich or poor.

The Sounding Sea | Eric William Barnum (b. 1979), George William Curtis, poet

O listen to the sounding sea
That beats on the remorseless shore
O listen! for that sound will be
When our wild hearts shall beat no more

O listen well and listen long!
For sitting folded close to me
You could not hear a sweeter song
Than that hoarse murmur of the sea

Sing, My Child | Sarah Quartel (b. 1982)

Soloists: Sara Brockmueller & Sam Johnston

Luminescence | Andrea Ramsey (b. 1977), Blaire Ginsburg, poet

The Blue Ridge | Elaine Hagenberg (b. 1979), Harriet Monroe, poet

Cells Planets | Erika Lloyd, arr. Vince Peterson

Soloists: Lindsey Clopp & Abby McLoughlin

Sunday (from Sunday in the Park with George) | Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021)

Thank you for joining us!

Save the Dates for Resound Ensemble's Fall 2024 Concerts

November 8th, 9th, & 11th, 2024