We Are The Music Makers PANUFNIK ROXANNA

Classique

Description :

"for the National Youth Choirs of Great Britain"
for junior-upper voice SSSA Choir and Double SATB Choir a cappella (Score)
Commissioned by the National Youth Choirs of Great Britain
Text is by Arthur W. E. O'Shaughnessy, adapted by Jessica Duchen.

Composer's Note

When the National Youth Choirs of Great Britain requested a short piece for their gala concert at Birmingham's Symphony Hall, I was particularly excited about the prospect of writing for 300 singers. A recent research trip to Estonia resulted in somewhat of a revelation: having heard and seen their world-renowned choirs in action (literally!) has resulted in We are the Music-Makers having the less mainstream "surround-sound" of upper voices/junior choir at the back and sides of the audience and a further stereophonic double-choir on stage.

This poem was sent to me by Tim Williams (my ex Head of English at school), and immediately seemed to fit this occasion. This text has already been set magnificently by Elgar, so partly to avoid any kind of comparison and also to bring its timeless message up to date, I asked my poet friend Jessica Duchen to give it a sligtly more contemporary feel.

A poem about global music-making (which ties in with the NYCGB's recent World-Music CD), it speaks about humankind, nation to nation, and the mention of Babel inspiring a "speakng of tongues" effect by using as many different international words for "music" as possible as an accompaniment (not an easy task, as many of them are similar to our own word!). These are: French (Musique), Romanian (Muzica), Swahili (Mahewa), Polish (Muzka), Estonian (Muusika), German (Muzik), Japanese (Ongaku), and Spanish (Música).