Your cart

Total
NZD
Shipping and discount codes are added at checkout.

Work


The Virgin and the Nightingale

five songs for voices

Year:  1986   ·  Duration:  25m
Instrumentation:  SSATBB (choir or ensemble) and flute

Year:  1986
Duration:  25m
Instrumentation  SSATBB (choir or ensemble) ...

Films, Audio & Samples

Sample Score

Sample: Pages 3-4,10-11,25,30,37-38

See details ➔

Borrow/Hire:

To borrow items or hire parts please email SOUNZ directly at info@sounz.org.nz.

About

The Virgin and the Nightingale was commissioned by Jones and Co with funding from the Music Board of the Australia Council, and first performed by The Song Company in 1992. The poems are taken from Fleur Adcock's collection of translations of mediaeval poems published by Bloodaxe Books as The Virgin and the nightingale, with kind permission of author and publisher. The five songs all focus on birds; the flute part in Love's Agent is a (transposed) transcription of a nightingale song. The settings are for SSATTB choir. The songs can be performed as a set or separately; some of them are suitable for choir.


Commissioned note

Commissioned by Jones and Co with funding from the Music Board of The Australia Council


Contents note

  1. Love's Agent (ensemble and flute)
  2. The Swan (SSATTB)
  3. The Thrush (TTB, flute)
  4. The Roasted Swan (SSATTB)
  5. The Anti-nightingale song (ensemble and flute)

Text note

Mediaeval Latin translation by Fleur Adcock


Performance history

Performed by The Song Company with Geoffrey Collins (flute)