Update Title: D940875A-2094-4169-BD92-35F092F5827D

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Letters to the World: reflections on the poetry of Emily Dickinson are five short pieces for piano quartet. Each movement is inspired by a particular Dickinson poem which may be read aloud before the musical portrait.

The correlation between poetic imagery and instrumental music has often fascinated the composer.  The poetry of Emily Dickinson, which encompasses a wide variety of topic and mood, presents itself as an appealing choice for a multi-movement chamber work.

The first movement, "Invocation," follows the reading of the familiar poem, "This is My Letter."  This music is intended as an invitation, a greeting and an opening message.  Thus, the piano initiates the music with open fifths and octaves.  The violin motive which arrives later might be heard to speak "This is my letter to the world which never wrote to me."  This movement is characterized by simplicity and tenderness, as evoked in the poem.

The second movement, "Spring," is inspired by the poem, "A Light Exists in Spring."  The poem describes a special light in March which is so delicate that it passes away.  The music opens with short patterns in the string, perhaps reflecting specks of light.  The middle section presents dancing patterns of light.  In the end, the patterns rise and the light fades away.

"Nobody! - or the Frog Pond" is inspired by the frog reference in the poem.  After some opening "banter" in the strings ("I'm Nobody. Who are You?), the pond comes alive.  With the piano providing background cricket sounds, a mosquito arrives, to be swatted.  Frogs croak.  Locusts trill.  The "Nobody" motive returns, and one last frog jumps into the pond.

The poem "Wild Nights!" has led to the fourth movement, "Passion."  The music is marked "with abandon" and "Passionately" throughout.  Rippling patters (the sea) predominate.  Oscillation between pitches may be heard as a boat tossing on the waves.  At the end, the boat settles into its mooring, as the poem closes with the lines "Might I but moor - Tonight - In Thee!"

"Indian Summer" is a celebration of the fullness of life.  Thus, the piano opens with expanding patterns, and sustained pedal sonorities.  This is fullness.  Other images which inspire the music are playfulness (the child referred to in the poem), which comes in the bouncing scalar patterns in the piano, and the leaf blowing in the wind, represented by the rising/falling lines in the strings.  The theme (viola, cello) is associated with the words "These are the days when Birds come back...These are the days when skies resume..."   All strings join together to praise "Oh Sacrament of summer days."  The unfolding patterns and rich sonorities from the beginning return to celebrate "thine immortal wine."

Gwyneth Walker

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