The Winged Joy

A Love Story in Seven Parts

1. Love is a Terrible Thing (Grace Fallow Norton)
2. The Message (Margaret Sackville)
3. The Cynic (Theodosia Garrison)
4. A Farewell (Harriet Monroe)
5. Love Came Back at Fall O’Dew (Lizette Reese)
6. Red May (A. Mary F. Robinson)
7. You Say There Is No Love (Grace Fallow Norton)

The music begins in four parts with the fullness of love. One by one it dwindles to a lonely unison as she learns the truth about her fickle lover. Gradually she finds the strength to spurn the man who broke her heart, sees the beauty in nature, and finally makes fun of the folly of young love.

Composer's Note

In searching for poems by women, as specified in the commission, I spent a lot of time at the library. I read scores of poems until I found a few that seemed to go together. Then it occurred to me that this was going to be the story of a woman's love. (After every performance at least one singer comes to me and bursts out, “That’s the story of my life!)

I have been asked how I develop musical ideas. That's a mysterious process. The poetry suggests the music. At the beginning of the piece, our heroine goes out alone. I was foreshadowing the coming loneliness, the ambiguity between happiness and unhappiness that is probably in all young people's love. That ambiguity is there from the start; you don't know whether it's major or minor. You'll note that throughout the cycle there's a continual juxtaposition between major and minor. In fact, the first piece ends with both major and minor. That's the kernel of the work.

Advice in performing the Winged Joy?  With all my music, I criticize musical details of performance less than I do the dramatic projection, the emotional effects. I find choruses too often sing with the same tone and the same style for wildly different emotions, different composers, and different ideas. I think choral singing should be more like opera, or a really fine actress who speaks words as she feels them. When you're singing "The Cynic," your tone should be totally different from "A Farewell," obviously. In the last piece, "You say there is no love," there should be a mocking quality. Singers should act with their voices.

Press and Commentary

“ … memorable and distinctive melodic material…stunning moments of expressive text setting.”
— Richard Cox, conductor

“One of the most substantial works written for women’s voices during the last two decades… All sections are narrative in manner, describing love in exquisite texts.”
— American Choral Foundation Research Memorandum