Flight Song

"Flight Song" was written as a gift to Dr. Anton Armstrong and the St. Olaf Choir. Kim writes: "I've had the pleasure of working with Anton Armstrong and the choir, and their performances have always been sublime. With this piece, I want to show my gratitude." ​

The piece was also the first collaboration with the Welsh poet Euan Tait. The imagery sings of each singer's hidden song, and the conductor drawing that song from the singers: their hidden, unfolding life stories, their deep longings. The arms of the conductor, like great wings, shape the singing; music is compassion and the singers' longing is to fly towards other's suffering. The final message is that music-making is the song of new life, fragile as the fall of a feather.

DETAILS:

• Instrumentation: SATB, SSAA or TTBB & piano
• Duration: 4 minutes
• Author/lyricist: Euan Tait
  
• Language: English
• Year: 2014
• Licensing: Earthsongs 

__________________________________________________________________________________________
  

     A J. W. Pepper Editor's Choice

________________________________________________________________________________________
  

THE TEXT

you have drawn this song from us.

Songs of lives unfolding

fly overhead, cry overhead:

longing, rising from the song within.

Moving like the rise and fall of wings,

hands that shape our calling voice

on the edge of answers

you’ve heard our cry, you’ve known our cry:

music’s fierce compassion flows from you.

The night is restless with the sounds we hear,

is broken, shaken by the cries of pain:

for this is music’s inner voice,

saying, yes, we hear you,

all you who cry aloud,

and we will fly, answering you:

so our lives sing, sing,

wild we will fly,

wild in spirit we will fly.

Like a feather falling from the wing,

fragile as a human voice,

afraid, uncertain,

alive to love, we sing as love,

afraid, uncertain,

yet our flight begins as song.​

Instrumentation: SATB, SSAA, or TTBB div. unaccompanied 

Duration:5minutes

Author/lyricist:Anon 20th century

Language: English

Year: 2011

Licensing: Norsk Musikkforlag

A work about hope in the darkest time of life. The text was written by a Jew hiding in Cologne, Germany, during World War 2 where the text was found scratched onto a wall. 

Commissioned by the St. Olaf Festival (Olavsfestdagene) in Trondheim, Norway, and premiered on July 30 by the Nidaros Cathedral Girls' Choir at an event with the bishop of Nidaros Tor Singsås and actress Liv Ullmann. The SATB version was premiered by the Nidaros Cathedral Boys' Choir on November 26, 2011, in Nidaros Cathedral, Trondheim. A TTBB version was commissioned and premiered by Chor Leoni and conductor Erick Lichte in 2017. Arrangments for wind ensemble or brass band are also available.

I believe in the sun, even when it's not shining.

I believe in love, even when I feel it not.

I believe in God, even when He is silent.

Anon. 20th Century