cradle songs

CRADLE SONGS (2008) Purchase Online

Premiere: March 7, 2008 by Fidelio, Christopher Walter, director
Duration: 10'

Instrumentation: SATB Chorus

Commissioned by Phillips Academy (Andover)

Settings of William Blake's two poems, both titled "A Cradle Song."

II. Songs of Experience: A Cradle Song

Sleep, sleep, beauty bright,
Dreaming in the joys of night;
Sleep, sleep; in thy sleep
Little sorrows sit and weep.

Sweet babe, in thy face
Soft desires I can trace,
Secret joys and secret smiles,
Little pretty infant wiles.

As thy softest limbs I feel,
Smiles as of the morning steal
O'er thy cheek, and o'er thy breast
Where thy little heart doth rest.

O the cunning wiles that creep
In thy little heart asleep!
When thy little heart doth wake,
Then the dreadful light shall break.