works

First Night



Info:

First Night
scored for: soprano and piano
duration: 3 minutes
text: Andrew Allport

Commissioned by/Premiere:

Writer/Composer (world premiere)
Courtney Huffman, soprano / Lisa Sylvester, piano
March 11, 2006 / Fisher Gallery, Los Angeles CA

Watch/Listen:

Live recording
Courtney Huffman, soprano / Lisa Sylvester, piano

About the work:

First Night is a brief song for soprano and piano which attempts to capture the moment of a spiritual or emotional awakening. For the composer this text seemed to clearly depict the feeling of that great first fling with someone that just might become something more. For the poet Andrew Allport, the awakening was more of a spiritual one referring to some brush with the divine. The two need not be mutually exclusive.

an excerpt from Andrew's text:

By and by, I began to be warm.
Event the sun was born somehow;
a great coat hung above,
frozen stiff in the shape of someone.

More about poet Andrew Allport