Oxford Book of Flexible Choral Songs

The third song is ‘You spotted snakes’, from A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Here the
fairies sing a lullaby and song of protection for Titania, their queen. This is a lovely
poem to inspire a composer, with its changes of mood between the spiky depiction of
snakes and other ‘evil’ creatures, and the calm and soothing lullaby sections.
The three songs may be sung separately or as a set.
Franz Schubert, adap. Alan Bullard: To Music (An die Musik)
A setting of a poem by Schubert’s friend Franz von Schober, ‘An die Musik’ is a song in
praise of the ability of music to heal and restore. One of Schubert’s most well-known
solo songs, it is here arranged for chorus.
Trad. British sea shanty, arr. Alan Bullard: Tom’s gone to Hilo
The shanty is a work song traditionally sung by sailors as they hoisted the sails of their
sailing ships, and this particular song laments the loss of a friend or loved one. Hilo
(pronounced here as ‘High-low’) is the port of Ilo in Peru, seen by some sailors as a place
of rest.
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Alan Bullard: Tread Softly
‘Tread Softly’ sets the memorable and richly colourful W. B. Yeats text ‘He wishes for the
cloths of Heaven’ from the collection The Wind among the Reeds. The setting particularly
focuses on the final line, ‘Tread softly, because you tread on my dreams’, and was
originally scored for upper voices.
Trad. Dominican Republic, arr. Juan Tony Guzmán: Two Songs of Quisqueya
This arrangement combines two folk songs from the Dominican Republic (for which
‘Quisqueya’ is the traditional name). ‘Por ahí María se va’ is a humorous call-andresponse
song used in social gatherings, usually with improvised words; the original
Spanish text refers to a mosquito fighting with a pig, whereas in the English paraphrase
a donkey and a monkey join the fray. ‘Palo, bonito palo’ joyfully praises the sound of
palos—a Dominican style of drumming—while asking San Antonio (St Anthony) for help
in finding love.
William Walton, adap. Alan Bullard: Under the greenwood tree
From Walton’s incidental music for the 1936 Twentieth Century Fox film of
Shakespeare’s As You Like It, featuring a youthful Laurence Olivier, this setting, originally
for solo voice, beautifully recreates the style of an Elizabethan lute-song.
Malcolm Archer: What is the song the stars sing?
Malcolm Archer’s setting of ‘What is the song the stars sing?’, with its light and rhythmic
legato lines, communicates the joy and wonder of Francis Thompson’s mystic poem,
which gives away very little of the troubled life the poet led.
James Rolmaz: Where did you get that hat?
The music-hall was a popular British stage entertainment of the later nineteenth
and early twentieth centuries, featuring a mix of popular songs, comedy, and circus
acts. ‘Where did you get that hat?’ offered opportunity for singing, comedy, and stage
‘business’, and has been revived in many forms over the years.
Charles Villiers Stanford, adap. Alan Bullard: Why does he gallop?
Stanford’s setting of Robert Louis Stevenson’s colourful poem ‘Windy Nights’, originally
for solo voice, effectively conjures up the image of the mysterious late-night rider with
a rhythmically galloping piano part.
Alan Bullard
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