Cheryl Frances-Hoad

The Cage Without Birds

Vocal Score. The Cage without Birds, for mixed children's choir, saxophone and organ, written for Sam Corkin's Palimpsest project, takes Schumann's Wehmut as its starting point. Schumann's song, from the Eichendorff Liederkreis Op. 39 describes 'Nightingales,sing[ing]/Their song of longing/From their dungeon cell'. In my little piece, motives from Schumann's melody are given to the saxophone, who represents a free, cageless bird. The text set is Richard Stokes' translation of a Jules Renard's prose poem of the same name, part of his Histoires Naturelles.