Dominick DiOrio

Change My Sorrow Into Song

• Instrumentation: SATB and piano
• Completed: May 2017
• Duration: 4 1/2 minutes
• Texts: Sara Teasdale, "Like barley bending"
• Video:
  • Change My Sorrow Into Song

    From the concert, "Home: Where is Your Heart?" Oct. 21, 2017, at the Lawrence Memorial Chapel in Appleton, Wisconsin: newVoices choir, under the direction of Dr. Phillip A. Swan.

• Audio:
  • Change My Sorrow Into Song
    
    Linn-Benton Community College Chamber Choir
    

    Raymund Ocampo, conductor

• Score Preview:
• Published:

  Hal Leonard - Rollo Dilworth Choral Series

• Commission and Dedication:

  This piece was generously commissioned by a consortium of choruses to benefit Chorus America, the advocacy, research, and leadership development organization that advances the choral field.

  AUGUSTANA CHOIR
  Jon Hurty, Conductor

  BACH SOCIETY OF DAYTON
  John Neely, Music Director

  CHORAL ARTS ENSEMBLE OF ROCHESTER
  Rick Kvam, Artistic Director

  HEARTLAND VOICES
  Dr. John G Slawson, Artistic Director/Principal Conductor

  LINN-BENTON COMMUNITY COLLEGE CHAMBER CHOIR
  Raymund Ocampo, Music Program Chair and Director of Choral Studies

  MASTERWORKS CHORALE (CA)
  Dr. Bryan Baker, Artistic Director

  NASHOBA VALLEY CHORALE
  Anne Watson Born, Director

  NEWVOICES
  Phillip A. Swan, Artistic Director

  PORTAGE CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL CHAMBER SINGERS
  Cynthia Hunter, Director of Choirs

  PROVIDENCE SINGERS
  Christine Noel, Artistic Director

  TEXAS LUTHERAN UNIVERSITY CHOIR
  Dr. Douglas R Boyer, Director, TLU School of Music & Choral Activities

  THE CHORAL PROJECT
  Daniel Hughes, Artistic Director

  THE MICHAEL O'NEAL SINGERS
  Michael O'Neal, Founder and Artistic Director

  UNIVERSITY UNITARIAN CHURCH
  Karen P. Thomas, Director of Music

• Program Note:

  Change My Sorrow Into Song is a setting of a pastoral and optimistic poem by Sara Teasdale. She uses the image of barley bending in the breezes is compared to overcoming struggle and adversity. This move from pain to joy is echoed in the music, with the feisty and exuberant rhythms and harmonies of Latin jazz. These sunnier moments are contrasted with more startling dissonances between the tonic and leading tone at dramatic moments in the work. The piece ends faster than it began, with strong syncopated accents and a brightness and fire to the final chords.

• Text:

  Like barley bending
  In low fields by the sea,
  Singing in hard wind
  Ceaselessly;

  Like barley bending
  And rising again,
  So would I, unbroken,
  Rise from pain;

  So would I softly,
  Day long, night long,
  Change my sorrow
  Into song.

  -- Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)

• Performances:
  • October 21, 2017 (consortium premiere)
    "Home: Where is your heart?"
    newVoices: Northeast Wisconsin Vocal Artists
    Phillip Swan, conductor
    Lawrence Memorial Chapel - Appleton, WI
  • March 15, 2018
    "The Grace of the World"
    Linn-Benton Community College Chamber Choir
    Raymund Ocampo, conductor
    Russell Tripp Performance Center - Albany, OR
  • June 8, 2018
    The Choral Project
    Daniel Hughes, conductor
    Congregational Church of San Mateo - San Mateo, CA
  • June 9, 2018
    The Choral Project
    Daniel Hughes, conductor
    Mission Santa Clara de Asis - Santa Clara, CA
  • June 10, 2018
    The Choral Project
    Peace United Church of Christ - Santa Cruz, CA
    Daniel Hughes, conductor