Moon Song (2024)
for Solo Oboe
Having been given the prompt in a “Composition for Non-Majors” class to compose a piece of music inspired by the night sky, my thoughts first landed on the French painter Henri Rousseau, whose paintings, some of which include the night sky as one of many subjects, I find to be deeply evocative and at times even soothing to look at. His night skies are always calm, almost empty of stars, with a single luminous moon casting a silvery glow over the whole scene. There are many paintings of his that make use of this motif, such as A Carnival Evening or The Sleeping Gypsy, but my favorite painting in this category is The Dream, a lush, dense, dark-toned image. I won’t burden this program note with a lengthy description of the painting, but there is a poem written by Rousseau to accompany it which I find equally evocative and atmospheric:
Yadwigha dans un beau rêve
S’étant endormie doucement
Entendait les sons d’une musette
Dont jouait un charmeur bien pensant.
Pendant que la lune reflète
Sur les fleurs, les arbres verdoyants,
Les fauves serpents prêtent l’oreille
Aux airs gais de l’instrument.
Having fallen into a gentle sleep
Yadwigha, in a dream
Heard the sound of a musette
Played by a benevolent musician.
While the moon shone down
Upon the flowers, the green trees,
The wild serpents listened to
The instrument’s merry tunes.
I endeavored in writing this short solo to try and discover what sounds might be found in the world that this painting and poem depict. What results is a musical portrait of the jungle, and the sounds that it hears at night.
Duration: 4 minutes.
Moon Song was completed in February of 2024.