I am the voice of the wind

Vocal score

Forces or Category: SATB (divisi) unaccompanied

New Horizons

for SATB with divisions, unaccompanied
This is a sensitive and uplifting setting of a text by Geraldine Atkinson, who tragically died aged 24. ...

I am the voice of the wind

Vocal score

Description

for SATB with divisions, unaccompanied
This is a sensitive and uplifting setting of a text by Geraldine Atkinson, who tragically died aged 24. The reflective nature of the music makes it particularly suitable for memorials. This piece is suitable for either amateur and professional choirs.

Programme Notes:

I am the voice of the wind was commissioned by long-time Vasari alto Elizabeth Atkinson and her husband Chris, in memory of their daughter Geraldine. Geraldine had just qualified as a doctor when she died suddenly on holiday in Iceland in 2009, aged just 24. The words are by Geraldine herself, a poem she called The spirit, which was written when she was only thirteen. It is a remarkable work, rich and profound, with beautiful images and a structural integrity that make it ideal for musical setting.
I have tried to capture its myriad moods, its mercurial evanescence, as well as its quiet inner strength, and to create a piece that is as celebratory as it is memorialising.
Copyright Gabriel Jackson

I am the voice of the wind

Vocal score

Gabriel Jackson

New Horizons

Composer Information

Gabriel Jackson (b.1962)

One of Britain's foremost composers, after three years as a chorister at Canterbury Cathedral, Gabriel Jackson went on to study composition with Richard Blackford and John Lambert at the Royal College of Music. Particularly acclaimed for his choral works, his liturgical pieces are in the repertoires of most of Britain's cathedral and collegiate choirs and he is a frequent collaborator with the leading professional groups of the world. From 2010-2013 he was Associate Composer to the BBC Singers. In 2014 his hour-long The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, commissioned for the 750th anniversary of Merton College, Oxford, was premiered in its chapel. May 2015 saw the premiere at the Latvian National Opera of Spring Rounds for soprano, choir and orchestra, commissioned by the Riga-based youth choir Kamer for their 25th anniversary. He was recently commissioned by The Marian Consort to write Stabat Mater to mark their 10th anniversary.

Gabriel Jackson's website

I am the voice of the wind

Vocal score

Gabriel Jackson

New Horizons

Reviews and Awards

" am the voice of the wind was commissioned by a member of the Vasari Singers in memory of a daughter who died cruelly young. The composer's ability to find a musical idea apposite to the subject is in evidence here, in this case a fluttering repeated figure in the sopranos that accompanies much of the piece. Textures are clean and pierced through with light, in line with the composer's intention to write a work 'as celebratory as it is memorialising'." - William Hedley, International Record Review, October 2012