Product Description
"The Gift to Sing" is a poem by James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938) published in 1917. The central theme of the text is one of
optimism and resilience, using the power of song meaning, more broadly, art
or any kind of artful, heightened expression to overcome adversity. Although
the poem can be interpreted broadly to pertain to any kind of struggle, it is
likely that Johnson, as a civil-rights activist was alluding
more specifically to the oppression African-Americans in the United States, a
struggle that continues to this day, in 2020. I composed this setting in
September of 2020, right after the Black Lives Matter protests that
took place that summer, so current events played a role in this interpretation
on my part as well.
If
one reads the poem as pertaining the continued struggle of African Americans,
some passages may come across as ambiguous. For instance, "I brood not over the
broken past" should not be taken as suggesting that the horrors of the past
should be forgotten, but as an injunction that the memory of these horrors
should not discourage us or diminish our resolve to work toward overcoming the
injustices.
The musical inspiration for the opening of
the piece comes from the song "Lonesome Valley," which starts with a pentatonic
melodic gesture. The pentatonic scale is often
used in African American Spirituals, Christian hymns, and folksongs (e.g.,
"Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," "Amazing Grace," "How Can I Keep from Singing?,"
"Red River Valley," "Oh Shenandoah").
The more rhythmic parts take inspiration from
the African-American spiritual tradition, as found for instance in the choral
music of Moses Hogan (1957-2003). Meanwhile, the tenor solo at the end, is
intended to be very loud, bright, and without the pronounced vibrato one would
find in a Western operatic style. This kind of bright and intense vocal sound
is not unfamiliar to most listeners, who may have encountered it in places as
varied as Sacred Harp singing, the opening of the Lion King
soundtrack, or the Muslim call to prayer.
This product was created by a member of ArrangeMe, Hal Leonard's global self-publishing community of independent composers, arrangers, and songwriters. ArrangeMe allows for the publication of unique arrangements of both popular titles and original compositions from a wide variety of voices and backgrounds.