Joyce Music – Barber: Chamber Music Songs
- At April 22, 2022
- By Great Quail
- In Joyce
- 0
I hope you may set all of “Chamber Music” in time. This was indeed partly my idea in writing it. The book is in fact a suite of songs and if I were a musician I suppose I should have set them to music myself.
—James Joyce, Letter to Geoffrey Molyneux Palmer, 19 July 1909
Songs Based on Chamber Music
(1935-1937)
For voice and piano
Three Songs, op. 10 (1935-1936)
1. Rain has fallen (Moderato; from Chamber Music XXXI)
2. Sleep now (Andante Tranquilo; from Chamber Music XXXIV)
3. I hear an army (Allegro con fuoco; from Chamber Music XXXVI)
“Of that so sweet imprisonment” (1935; Con moto; from Chamber Music XXII)
“Strings in the earth and air” (1935; Moderato; from Chamber Music I)
“In the dark pinewood” (1937; Moderato; from Chamber Music XX)
From their conception, James Joyce imagined the poems of Chamber Music as lyrics awaiting music, ready for a fine Irish tenor not unlike himself. Two months after they were printed, Dublin organist and composer Geoffrey Molyneux Palmer granted his wish, translating eight of the poems into songs. (Joyce enthusiastically urged Palmer to set the remaining 28 poems!) Belfast music critic W.B. Reynolds followed him a year later. Although neither published their work, Adolph Mann did, producing “Out By Donnycarney” in Cincinnati in 1910. Based on Poem XXXI, it was the first time James Joyce was published in America! Many more settings would follow, and today there are hundreds of songs drawn from Chamber Music.
Samuel Barber’s settings were made between 1935 and 1937. Scored for voice and piano, they were composed during Barber’s early period, concurrent with Adagio for Strings and Symphony In One Movement. The Library of Congress introduces these songs quite thoroughly:
In 1935, Samuel Barber was awarded the prestigious Prix de Rome, granting him a two-year period of study at the American Academy in Rome. While at the Academy, Barber composed several new songs, choosing poems from James Joyce’s Chamber Music as the texts for his settings. Of these songs composed, “Rain has fallen,” “Sleep now,” and “I hear an army,” were published collectively as Three Songs, op. 10, by G. Schirmer in 1939. The songs are related thematically, as each describes a love affair, as well as musically, with the first and last songs set in the key of C minor (A minor in the low voice edition), and the middle song residing a minor third lower. The first two songs were dedicated, respectively, to Barber’s friends Dario Cecchi and his sister Susanna, both of whom shared the composer’s appreciation of Joyce’s poetry.
Barber possessed an uncanny ability in choosing intelligent texts and was equally sensitive in setting the music to suit the poetry. He appreciated the rhythmic flow of the words and would often shift meters in his musical settings to accommodate the natural rhythm of the text. This is indeed the case in each of the songs in the op. 10 collection. Furthermore, each of the Three Songs also displays Barber’s penchant for embodying the meaning of the text in the piano accompaniment. For example, the accompaniment of the first song in the collection, “Rain has fallen,” is laden with arpeggios, undoubtedly intended to mimic the patter of rain. And in the finale of the collection, “I hear an army,” Barber uses an aggressive, galloping accompaniment to mirror Joyce’s poetic comparison of the approach of an army (and its thunderous horses) with that of the anger, bitterness, and betrayal experienced after the dissolution of a relationship.
The first two songs of the collection received their premiere in Rome at the Villa Aurelia at the American Academy on 22 April 1936, with Barber accompanying himself at the piano. The third song was heard nearly a year later, on 7 March 1937, at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia with mezzo-soprano Rose Bampton accompanied by the composer.
Of the myriad versions of Chamber Music, Samuel Barber’s settings are my favorites. Written while James Joyce was still alive, they’re unburdened by the reverence found in many latter Joyce-inspired works: there’s no sense of profound importance here, just discerning attention paid to the words themselves. A master of the “art song,” Barber is a better songwriter than Joyce was a poet, and his sophisticated settings give Joyce’s poems a vitality they sometimes lack on the page. Like sunlight on jewels, Barber’s music makes the verses sparkle and glow, revealing different facets and hidden depths. The ivory patter that opens “Rain has fallen,” the galloping that propels “I hear an army” towards its nightmare conclusion, the rising and falling arpeggios of “In the dark pinewood”—the piano remains sensitive to the lyrics, a nimble partner in a graceful dance between youthful innocence and bittersweet experience.
Excerpt from Samuel Barber: The Composer and His Music
By Barbara Heyman
Samuel Barber: The Composer and His Music
Oxford University Press, 1992
While at the academy, Barber also set to music four poems from James Joyce’s Chamber Music. The earliest, “Of that so sweet imprisonment,” was completed on 17 November 1935. “Rain has fallen,” “Sleep now,” and “Strings in the earth and air” were composed within a week of each other on 21 and 29 November and 5 December respectively. Two more Joyce poems were set later during a period of great happiness in St. Wolfgang, Austria—“I hear an army,” completed on 13 July 1936, and “In the dark pinewood” in 1937.
Of the six Joyce songs, “Rain has fallen,” “Sleep now,” and “I hear an army” were published by G. Schirmer in 1939 as Opus no. 10. Although it is not known on what basis Barber selected these three songs for publication, the choice seems logical since they form an interesting and unified cycle: they are tonally related—the first and last are in the same key (A minor for the low-voice edition, C minor for high voice), and the second song lies a minor third below; and the texts of the three songs provide a strong unity of theme and image—Barber mirrors the course of a love affair in settings that progress from lyrical to dramatic. “Rain has fallen” and “Sleep now” were dedicated respectively to Dario Cecchi and his sister Susanna, two Italian friends of Barber’s with whom he shared the pleasures of Joyce’s poetry. Suso Cecchi d’Amico said that at the time these songs were written James Joyce was their “discovery of the moment.” “We were all very young,” d’Amico recalled, “and we were very fond of Sam’s compositions. We didn’t discuss the poems together, they were a shared love.” For Barber, however, the reading was probably exploratory as well, for he always had in the back of his mind the feeling that he might come across a usable song text. His attraction to Joyce’s lyrics was undoubtedly determined more by the inherent lyricism and imagery of the poetry and its potential for translation into rhythmic and melodic language than by its popularity. Even though Barber’s songs were published before Joyce’s death in 1943, there is no evidence in either Joyce’s or Barber’s writings that the poet ever heard the songs.
Excerpt from Essay: “Opus Posthumous: James Joyce, Gottfried Keller, Othmar Schoeck, and Samuel Barber”
By Sebastian D.G. Knowles
Bronze by Gold: Joyce and Music
Garland Publishing, 1999
Barber wrote three other song settings of poems from Chamber Music during this period, which were published together as Op. 10 in 1939: “Rain Has Fallen,” “Sleep Now,” and “I Hear an Army” have now entered the literature as standard pieces for the rising young vocalist. These are more complex pieces, both to play and to sing, tracing a new adventurousness in Barber’s style. Where the three settings without opus numbers hold a single mood, reflective and undisturbed, the settings in Op. 10 each reach appassionato climaxes. The first climax, from “Rain Has Fallen,” anticipates two of Joyce’s siren songs, paralleling in its rhythm “Oh my Dolores” as trilled by Lydia Douce, the climax to “The Shade of the Palm,” and paralleling in its text the final “Come…! […] To me!” of “M’appari,” sung by Simon Dedalus. The climax of “Sleep Now,” in its text, takes us to “Sirens” again, via the aria “All is lost now” [Tutto è sciolto] from La Sonnambula. The third climax, from “I Hear an Army,” is, like the other two but more obviously so, a moment out of the piece’s natural rhythm, a lyrical elasticization of what is an otherwise forcefully rhythmic piece with a vibrant martial gallop; this is Barber’s nod to Schubert’s “Erlkönig,” where a different horse’s rhythm, also in the left hand, similarly stops for breath as the father discovers his dead son in his arms.
In the three published poems Barber takes the art song to a more visceral level: the hoofirons that ring steelily in “I Hear an Army” are the heartbeats of the abandoned lover. The poem was set to music in 1936 while Barber was in Austria, two years before Hitler’s incorporation of the country: the army is both a mobilizing war machine and an imaginary army of the heart. The heart, the last word of both “Rain Has Fallen” and “Sleep Now,” is Barber’s principal focus in Op. 10. The “unquiet heart” of “Sleep Now” continues the imagery of sleep found in “Of That So Sweet Imprisonment,” in which “Sleep to dreamier sleep be wed, / Where soul with soul lies prisoned.” And this imprisoned heart, beating in a perpetual sleep, may quop, as Blooms does in “Lestrygonians,” less softly when we remember “In the Dark Pinewood,” possibly the darkest of the six texts in its subject matter. There is an obvious pun on “wood” in “In the dark pinewood I would we lay,” which conceals a second pun on “pine.” The speaker pines to lie with his lover, yes, but pine is also the wood of choice when building a coffin. This further pun points obliquely to an issue that is central to all Joyce’s work, an issue Barber continues in his later, much more experimental, and much more disturbing settings of Joyce. When Joyce writes “In the dark pinewood I would we lay” he is writing about being buried alive.
Liner Notes from Samuel Barber: The Complete Songs
By Dylan Perez
Samuel Barber: The Complete Songs
Resonus, 2022
Born in 1910, Samuel Barber knew what he wanted from very early in his life. Such strength of character and courage to follow his path is heard in his music; at a me when American classical music was heavily influenced by experimentalism, Barber’s inclination for ‘traditional’ harmony and melody helped set him apart. What I have always loved about Barber’s vocal music is the ease he finds in the marriage of text and music. Even in the posthumous songs, some recorded here for the first time, he always puts the text first, inspired by both contemporary and ancient texts.
Barber had a long fascination with the words of James Joyce. As a truly intelligent and well-read composer, we can hear his understanding of even the thickest of Joyce’s texts in his Three Songs, Op. 10. The gentle droplets heard at the beginning of ‘Rain has fallen’ lead us into a charged emotional landscape of two lovers. Barber explores his truly dramatic side in the piano writing, with wide, orchestral sweeps and intimate chromaticism. ‘Sleep now’ is a tender but urgent plea for emotional rest. There are sighs in the piano, as if breathing along with the vocal line, that are gentle at the start but grow to cries as the text becomes more intense. ‘I hear an army’ is a song of mammoth proportions. From the whiplash of the first bars to the stomping final chords, there is little reprieve from the onslaught of this fantastical army.
Texts
Three Songs op. 10
1. Rain has fallen
Rain has fallen all the day.
O come along the laden trees:
The leaves lie thick upon the way
Of memories.
Staying a little by the way
Of memories shall we depart.
Come, my beloved, where I may
Speak to your heart.
2. Sleep now
Sleep now, O sleep now,
O you unquiet heart!
A voice crying “Sleep now”
Is heard in my heart.
The voice of the winter
Is heard in the door.
O sleep, for the winter
Is crying “Sleep no more.”
My kiss will give you peace now
And quiet to your heart—
Sleep on in peace now,
O you unquiet heart!
3. I hear an army
I hear an army charging upon the land,
And hear the thunder of horses plunging, foam about their
knees:
Arrogant, in black armour, behind them stand,
Disdaining the reins, with fluttering whips, the
charioteers.
They cry unto the night their battle name:
I moan in sleep when I hear afar their whirling
laughter.
They cleave the gloom of dreams, a blinding flame,
Clanging, clanging upon the heart as upon an anvil.
They come shaking in triumph their long, green hair:
They come out of the sea and run shouting by the
shore.
My heart, have you no wisdom thus to despair?
My love, my love, my love, why have you left me
alone?
Of that so sweet imprisonment
Of that so sweet imprisonment
My soul, dearest, is fain—
Soft arms that woo me to relent
And woo me to detain.
Ah, could they ever hold me there
Gladly were I prisoner!
Dearest, through interwoven arms
By love made tremulous,
That night allures me where alarms
Nowise may trouble us;
But sleep to dreamier sleep be wed
Where soul with soul lies prisoned.
Strings in the earth and air
Strings in the earth and air
Make music sweet;
Strings by the river where
The willows meet.
There’s music along the river
For Love wanders there,
Pale flowers on his mantle,
Dark leaves on his hair.
All softly playing,
With head to music bent,
And fingers straying
Upon an instrument.
In the dark pinewood
In the dark pinewood
I would we lay,
In deep cool shadows
At noon of day.
How sweet it is to lie there,
Sweet to kiss,
Where the great pine-forest
Enaisled is!
Thy kiss descending
Sweeter were
With the soft tumult
Of thy hair.
O, unto the pinewood
At noon of day
Come with me now,
Sweet love, away
Recordings
Compact Disc: Complete Songs
There are two recordings of Samuel Barber’s complete songs available on compact disc.
Barber: The Complete Songs (a.k.a. “Secrets of the Old”)
Cheryl Studer, Thomas Hampson, John Browning, Emerson Quartet
CD: Deutsche Grammophon, 1992
Recorded in 1991-1992 and released on Deutsche Grammophon in 1994, this venerable 2-CD set has never been out of print, a mandatory purchase for fans of Samuel Barber’s elegantly-crafted art songs. It features the soprano Cheryl Studer and the baritone Thomas Hampson, with John Browning on piano and the Emerson String Quartet backing Dover Beach. Having boasted several album covers and titles—including Secrets of the Old—this set continues to shine thirty years later. The liner notes are sparse and the production favors contemporary notions of close-miking and reverb, but the performances are stellar, all musicians in top form. John Browning was Barber’s own choice to première his Pulitzer-Prize winning Piano Concerto, so he’s as definitive a Barber interpreter as the twentieth century has to offer. Cheryl Studer is magnificent. While some operatic sopranos might be tempted to showy displays, Studer allows the lyrics to dictate her delivery, and she touches each word with an appropriate amount of grace, irony, impishness, and sorrow. (Her Nuvoletta is a delight!) And Thomas Hampson’s silky baritone is always a pleasure to hear. Although his voice is darker than the tenor Joyce had in mind, he brings a richness to each of his selections, especially the dramatic clangor of “I hear an army.” A collection that’s stood the test of time, Secrets of the Old—or whatever it’s being called at the moment!—belongs in the library of every classical music fan.
You can hear all the Chamber Music-related songs from this recording on YouTube, including Three Songs op. 10, “Of that so sweet imprisonment,” “Strings in the earth and air,” and “In the dark pinewood.”
Samuel Barber: The Complete Songs
Dylan Perez, Fluer Barron, Jess Dandy, Louise Kemény, Soraya Mafi, Dominic Sedgwick, Nicky Spence, & others
CD: Resonus, 2022
Since 1994, fans of Samuel Barber had only the Deutsche Grammophon Secrets of the Old set to represent Barber’s complete songs. As good as that set is, thirty years of the same interpretations can become overfamiliar! Fortunately, this 2-CD set by Resonus has arrived to freshen things up. Interested visitors are directed to the Brazen Head review of Samuel Barber: The Complete Songs.
Compact Disc: Selected Joyce Songs
There are dozens of recordings of Barber’s Chamber Music songs; too many to list here. The following selections represent historically important recordings, near-complete recordings, or personal favorites.
Leontyne Price Sings Barber
Soprano: Leontyne Price, Piano: Samuel Barber
CD: BMG, 1994 (Recordings from 1953-1968)
The great soprano Leontyne Price was Samuel Barber’s Cleopatra in his notoriously failed opera, Antony and Cleopatra. This CD collects Barber recordings she made in the 1950s and 1960s, and includes excerpts from the opera, as well as Nuvoletta and “Sleep now” from Three Songs op. 10. Samuel Barber himself plays the piano.
Barber: Songs
Soprano: Roberta Alexander, Piano: Tan Crone
CD: Etcetera, 1988
This set features the soprano Roberta Alexander accompanied by pianist Tan Crone. Released in 1988 on Etcetera, the set is erroneous labeled Barber: Complete Songs on Amazon. For the interests of Joyce enthusiasts, the CD contains Three Songs op. 10, Nuvoletta, “Solitary Hotel,” and “In the dark pinewood.” Alexander also recorded a version of “I hear an army” with full orchestra.
Samuel Barber: Vocal and Chamber Works
Baritone: Sir Thomas Allen, Piano: Roger Vignoles
Digital: Warner Classics, 1994
For the interests of Joyce enthusiasts, this set contains Three Songs op. 10, “Solitary Hotel,” and “Now have I fed and eaten up the rose.”
Songs by Samuel Barber
Baritone: Gerald Finley, Piano: Julius Drake
CD: Hyperion, 2007
This set features the baritone Gerald Finley—“Doctor Atomic” himself—with pianist Julius Drake. It contains Three Songs op. 10 and “In the dark pinewood.”
Mélodies Passagères: The Songs of Samuel Barber
Soprano: Gweneth-Ann Jeffers, Piano: Stephen de Pledge
CD: Quartz, 2012
For the interests of Joyce enthusiasts, this set contains Three Songs op. 10, Nuvoletta, and “Solitary Hotel.”
Online Video
The following live performances are available on YouTube.
Three Songs, op. 10
Baritone: Maurice Lenhard, Piano: Noritaka Tsutsui
A live performance from 23 July 2015, recorded at the Hochschule für Musik Trossingen.
“I hear an army”
Baritone: Simon Barrad, Piano: Joel Papinoja
A live performance from 18 January 2017, recorded at the Helsinki Music Centre.
Three Songs, op. 10
Baritone: Mauro Borgioni, Piano: Filippo Farinelli
A live performance from 17 September 2018, recorded at San Filippo Neri’s Church in Perugia during the “Sagra Musicale Umbra” festival.
Additional Information
Samuel Barber Wikipedia Page
The Wikipedia entry on Samuel Barber borrows much of its material from Barber Heyman’s biography.
Library of Congress Samuel Barber Collection
The Library of Congress holds several of Barber’s works available for viewing as PDFs, including the original scores to “Rain has fallen,” “Solitary Hotel,” and “I hear an army.”
Samuel Barber: Other Joyce-Related Works
Samuel Barber Main Page
Return to the Brazen Head’s Samuel Barber profile.
Nuvoletta (1947)
A playful song with lyrics adapted from Finnegans Wake.
“Solitary Hotel” (1969)
From Despite & Still, this song has lyrics adapted from Ulysses.
Fadograph of a Yestern Scene (1971)
A short orchestra piece inspired by a line in Finnegans Wake. [Coming Soon]
“Now have I fed and eaten up the rose” (1972)
This song is based on James Joyce’s translation of a German poem by Gottfried Keller. It’s about a man who is buried alive.
Author: Allen B. Ruch
Last Modified: 20 July 2022
Joyce Music Page: Bronze by Gold
Main Joyce Page: The Brazen Head
Contact: quail(at)shipwrecklibrary(dot)com