Bird Songs for soprano and piano (2005)
texts by William Carlos Williams
i The Manœuvre
ii The Predicter of Famine
iii The Woodthrush
iv Against the Sky
v Silence
14 minutes
This set represents the third time that I have drawn on the poetry of William Carlos Williams for texts (although the last song is a reworking of an earlier setting). Each poem captures a scene in which the presence of one or more birds, while seemingly incidental in some instances, somehow refocuses the way we see the world and ourselves.