Professor Rankine wrote a powerful poem that I posted here. As we continue to rehearse Dr. Dilworth’s setting for the poem, I discover more about how the music brings out the further meaning of the poem.
The poem starts in the peaceful environment of a university archive (“On a scrap of paper in the archives is written I have forgotten my umbrella.”) and the music is tranquil yet with a surprisingly urgent beat. Next it discusses the confusion of information that accompanied the start of the pandemic and the music takes on swirls and yet is in a persistent twelve-bar blues setting. Then for the devastating stanza “Six feet under for underlying conditions. Black” there is a dark and dissonant chord on the word “Black”.
The most poignant repetitions are “eight minutes forty-eight seconds” over and over, then leading to “I can’t breathe” over and over. The music drops out of the twelve-bar blues to an urgent, rattling dissonance and confusion the concludes with repetitions of “in extremis.” Was the poet also making a reference to extremism here? That could be a valid interpretation.
Then the music begins a march to accompany “whatever contracts keep us social compel us now to disorder the disorder,” perhaps inviting us to march in protest.
The piece concludes with a reinstatement of tranquility as the poet observes “There’s an umbrella by the door, not for yesterday but for the weather that’s here” and builds to the sound of strength as the chorus declaims “We are here for the storm that’s storming because what’s taken matters.”
This is why I love music so much, and choral singing in particular. It adds a drama to the words that is unmatched.
We must be soldiers for Art! 