O Cool is the Valley Now

A verdant valley with a river leading to a lake

SKU: RP010

Price: $7.50

Length: 4'45"

Instrumentation: mezzo-soprano, flute, clarinet, trumpet, and piano

Delivery: PDF score and parts will be delivered via email within a few days

Written in the Spring of 2011 for mezzo-soprano Maren Beckman, O Cool is the Valley Now (for mezzo-soprano, flute, clarinet, trumpet, and piano) is a setting of James Joyce’s (1882–1941) poem of the same name.

O cool is the valley now

And there, love, will we go

For many a choir is singing now

Where Love did sometime go.

And hear you not the thrushes calling,

Calling us away?

O cool and pleasant is the valley

And there, love, will we stay.

The piece uses a method of harmonization which I call polymodality which blends four modes at the same time, creating highly chromatic yet highly consonant music.

O Cool is the Valley Now tied for second place in the 2011 Minnesota Music Educators Association Collegiate Composition Contest in the Chamber Group division.

Recording of O Cool is the Valley Now by CSU staff at the Aries Composers Festival