Roundup of Texas Art Song Composers
Lane Harder, composer
Her Irretrievable Way - Text by Wallace Stevens
1. Explanation
2. The Paltry Nude Starts on a Spring Voyage
3. Gubbinal
Notes from the composer, Lane Harder:
American poet Wallace Stevens (1879-1955) produced a body of poetry unrivaled in the English language for its marriage of
sparkling surfaces with deep philosophical underpinnings. His first published collection, Harmonium (1923), is an assemblage
of stunning breadth and depth, including what fellow poet and colleague Marianne Moore described as "...prismatically colored
ideas by a mind at once wise and whimsical." The multilingual turns of phrase, the reliance on ancient (and alternate) meanings
of words, and a non-obvious syntax combined with unforgettable imagery and metaphor makes for poems that are, by turns,
chilly and remote but also heartening and warm. The poems set in this collection of songs are all from this magnificent volume.
- notes by the composer, May 2020
Explanation
Ach, Mutter,
This old, black dress,
I have been embroidering
French flowers on it.
Not by way of romance,
Here is nothing of the ideal,
Nein,
Nein.
It would have been different,
Liebchen,
If I had imagined myself,
In an orange gown,
Drifting through space,
Like a figure on the church-wall.
The Paltry Nude Starts on a Spring Voyage
But not on a shell, she starts,
Archaic, for the sea.
But on the first-found weed
She scuds the glitters,
Noiselessly, like one more wave.
She too is discontent
And would have purple stuff upon her arms,
Tired of the salty harbors,
Eager for the brine and bellowing
Of the high interiors of the sea.
The wind speeds her on,
Blowing upon her hands
And watery back.
She touches the clouds, where she goes
In the circle of her traverse of the sea.
Yet this is meagre play
In the scrurry and water-shine
As her heels foam ---
Not as when the goldener nude
Of a later day
Will go, like the centre of sea-green pomp,
In an intenser calm,
Scullion of fate,
Across the spick torrent, ceaselessly,
Upon her irretrievable way.
Gubbinal
That strange flower, the sun,
Is just what you say.
Have it your way.
The world is ugly,
And the people are sad.
That tuft of jungle feathers,
That animal eye,
Is just what you say.
That savage of fire,
That seed,
Have it your way.
The world is ugly,
And the people are sad.
Her Irretrievable Way - Text by Wallace Stevens
1. Explanation
2. The Paltry Nude Starts on a Spring Voyage
3. Gubbinal
Notes from the composer, Lane Harder:
American poet Wallace Stevens (1879-1955) produced a body of poetry unrivaled in the English language for its marriage of
sparkling surfaces with deep philosophical underpinnings. His first published collection, Harmonium (1923), is an assemblage
of stunning breadth and depth, including what fellow poet and colleague Marianne Moore described as "...prismatically colored
ideas by a mind at once wise and whimsical." The multilingual turns of phrase, the reliance on ancient (and alternate) meanings
of words, and a non-obvious syntax combined with unforgettable imagery and metaphor makes for poems that are, by turns,
chilly and remote but also heartening and warm. The poems set in this collection of songs are all from this magnificent volume.
- notes by the composer, May 2020
Explanation
Ach, Mutter,
This old, black dress,
I have been embroidering
French flowers on it.
Not by way of romance,
Here is nothing of the ideal,
Nein,
Nein.
It would have been different,
Liebchen,
If I had imagined myself,
In an orange gown,
Drifting through space,
Like a figure on the church-wall.
The Paltry Nude Starts on a Spring Voyage
But not on a shell, she starts,
Archaic, for the sea.
But on the first-found weed
She scuds the glitters,
Noiselessly, like one more wave.
She too is discontent
And would have purple stuff upon her arms,
Tired of the salty harbors,
Eager for the brine and bellowing
Of the high interiors of the sea.
The wind speeds her on,
Blowing upon her hands
And watery back.
She touches the clouds, where she goes
In the circle of her traverse of the sea.
Yet this is meagre play
In the scrurry and water-shine
As her heels foam ---
Not as when the goldener nude
Of a later day
Will go, like the centre of sea-green pomp,
In an intenser calm,
Scullion of fate,
Across the spick torrent, ceaselessly,
Upon her irretrievable way.
Gubbinal
That strange flower, the sun,
Is just what you say.
Have it your way.
The world is ugly,
And the people are sad.
That tuft of jungle feathers,
That animal eye,
Is just what you say.
That savage of fire,
That seed,
Have it your way.
The world is ugly,
And the people are sad.
Lane Harder
The music of Lane Harder has been described as “vibrant,” “highly-crafted,” (Percussive Notes) “dramatic,” “aggressive and engaging,” (Austin American Statesman) and possessing an “eclectic, always intriguing, take on modernist tonality” (Theater Jones).
Harder’s music has been recognized with multiple awards from ASCAP as well as awards from NACUSA, Voices of Change, the Percussive Arts Society, The Florence Gould Foundation, and the Texas Music Teachers Association.
The music of Lane Harder has been described as “vibrant,” “highly-crafted,” (Percussive Notes) “dramatic,” “aggressive and engaging,” (Austin American Statesman) and possessing an “eclectic, always intriguing, take on modernist tonality” (Theater Jones).
Harder’s music has been recognized with multiple awards from ASCAP as well as awards from NACUSA, Voices of Change, the Percussive Arts Society, The Florence Gould Foundation, and the Texas Music Teachers Association.