“Joy” (Gardner)
Vocal: alto and violin
“Joy” was composed between December, 1998 and February, 1999. It is a setting of a poem by Virginia poet Thomas Gardner, whom I met when we were both living in Finland as Fulbright Fellows. Upon hearing a reading of the work, Dr. Gardner wrote the following, which captures the piece far more eloquently than I can:
“What I liked about “Joy” was the way you controlled the emotional tempo–for want of a better phrase. I could hear in the starts and stops, the pauses, the rises in volume, the way the speaker hesitates, then tries to get through to the lover; the almost thrusting madness of trying to step or burst through; then the calm at the end, which feels almost won or earned by the effort, and by the putting aside of the effort. The last line seems very lovely to me, now–brand new when I first heard the piece; I didn’t really recall writing it.”