The Gift

Mixed chorus (SATB) with piano, 4'00". Designed to lift an audience out of their seats, this setting of James Weldon Johnson's "The Gift to Sing" celebrates the power and magic of music. 
​Commissioned by the Albany (CA) High School All-Choir, Mary Stocker, director. 
World premiere: March 28, 2018, 7:00pm, Albany, CA

Mary requested a program closer, full of energy and accessible to a wide range of singing abilities. “The Gift” is a soul/pop-style tune that begins slow and reflective before building to a huge and exuberant chorus. The goal is not only to bring the audience to their feet, but to give the choir something they’ll want to perform year after year. 

The Gift to Sing*, by James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938)
(*Mary and I decided to shorten the title for this composition)

Sometimes the mist overhangs my path,
And blackening clouds about me cling;
But, oh, I have a magic way
To turn the gloom to cheerful day--
      I softly sing.

And if the way grows darker still,
Shadowed by Sorrow’s somber wing,
With glad defiance in my throat,
I pierce the darkness with a note,
       And sing, and sing.
​
I brood not over the broken past,
Nor dread whatever time may bring;
No nights are dark, no days are long,
While in my heart there swells a song,
       And I can sing.