for Soprano and Live Electronics

Poem by Oscar Wilde

This setting of Oscar Wilde’s poem of the same name employs MAX/MSP. All of the sounds are a product of real-time processing or prerecorded sounds generated from the soprano’s voice.

Soprano, Renee Saindon, gave the first performance on May 14, 2009 at the Longy School of Music.

Text:

O singer of Persephone!
In the dim meadows desolate
Dost thou remember Sicily?

Still through the ivy flits the bee
Where Amaryllis lies in state;
O Singer of Persephone!

Simaetha calls on Hecate
And hears the wild dogs at the gate;
Dost thou remember Sicily?

Still by the light and laughing sea
Poor Polypheme bemoans his fate;
O Singer of Persephone!

And still in boyish rivalry
Young Daphnis challenges his mate;
Dost thou remember Sicily?

Slim Lacon keeps a goat for thee,
For thee the jocund shepherds wait;
O Singer of Persephone!

Dost thou remember Sicily?