Description

Summer
An Anglo-American setting

for Baritone and Piano
Duration: ca. 3’30”

Words by Alan Gilott
Music by Edward Caine

“There is something unique about sitting in a deck chair on an English lawn dozily taking for granted the atmosphere of a sunny summer’s day. Here I was, though, sitting in an Adirondack chair surrounded by an altogether different sward with a similar, but altered, ambience leaving me feeling quite surreal…” – Alan Gillott

“Something about the pastoral and quintessentially English nature of Alan’s writing in this poem as well as its references to English birds and the uneasy American setting begged me to explore the points at which American and English 20th century art-song traditions collide. In the setting there are fleeting references to Vaughan Williams, Finzi, a heavy dose of Britten, Barber, Ives, Billings and Jazz. The piece explores the different approaches to modality and gesture. In my mind I imagined them fighting it out, and it took some soul-searching to decide which would win in the end. I chose indecisiveness, and was chuckling to myself as I wrote the last two bars.” – Edward Caine