Modern Love: XXX (2018)

for mezzo-soprano with chamber ensemble (fl, cl, vn, vc)

Download a .pdf of the score here.

Program Note:

What are we first? First, animals; and next

Intelligences at a leap; on whom

Pale lies the distant shadow of the tomb,

And all that draweth on the tomb for text.

Into which state comes Love, the crowning sun:

Beneath whose light the shadow loses form.

We are the lords of life, and life is warm.

Intelligence and instinct now are one.

But nature says: “My children most they seem

When they least know me: therefore I decree

That they shall suffer.” Swift doth young Love flee,

And we stand wakened, shivering from our dream.

Then if we study Nature we are wise.

Thus do the few who live but with the day:

The scientific animals are they-

Lady, this is my sonnet to your eyes.

-George Meredith, Modern Love XXX (1862)

In his series of poems titled Modern Love, Victorian writer and poet George Meredith expresses his critique of the status of love in his society. I have paired his words with brief instrumental interludes, which subtly provide my tongue-in-cheek critique of romance in the modern day.

Performance History:

2019 - 01 - 23: Julia Barber, Tristan Durie, Tiago Delgado, Saba Yousefi, Dongso Julia Kim - Walter Hall, Toronto (premiere)