Songs of the Invisible Summer Stars
For score and parts, click here for CMC link to Songs of the Invisible Summer Stars.
Title: Songs of the Invisible Summer Stars
Year Completed: 2017, revised 2019
Duration: 20 mins
Instrumentation: Flute, oboe, horn, violin (2), viola, cello, bass.
*Can be played as a chamber version with one per part, or a chamber orchestra version with string ensemble and solo winds.
Credits: Commisisoned by Toronto Summer Music through the generous support of the Esther Gelber Fund, administered by the Canadian Music Centre.
Premiere: TSO Chamber Soloists, August 2 2017, Walter Hall, Toronto. Chamber orchestral premiere by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, led by concertmaster Jonathan Crow November 16 2019, Roy Thomson Hall, Toronto.
Program Note
In extreme northern and southern latitudes, summer nights are bright as the sun stays above the horizon or dips just below before rising in a glow of unending twilight. Darkness is gone for months, and so are the stars and aurora.
Under the glow of these soft star-less nights, I wrote 5 short songs imagining where the stars go when we can’t see them anymore. I used these melodies and ideas as the inspiration for these instrumental works. Below are the lyrics for each of the songs.
1.Where do the stars play when they disappear in the summer?
Where do the stars play when they disappear in the summer?
They play among the shadows fallen, far away.
2. Comet River
When there is no gravity
Downstream means nothing,
Nor upstream
3. A Clandestine Meeting with an Aurora
When she sends her light around me
When she sends her arms of light around my outward star
We shine green fire
Like sky dew shining on new sky leaves.
4. Sway me around, Orion!
Sway, oh sway Orion!
Come, sway me around!
5.When the Moon Hangs Lonely in the Blue Sky,
When the moon hangs lonely in the blue sky,
Then the moon calls out
“Far away star,
come home and bring the snow.”
And check out the vocal version of ALL FIVE “songs” here: