Echo for Mezzo-soprano and Lute by Ben Rowarth.
Commissioned by Helen Charlston and York Early Music Festival. First performed on 12 June 2024 by Helen Charlston (mezzo) and Toby Carr (lute) at Purbeck Art Weeks Festival.
Prelude
Dream
Interlude
Echo
Programme Notes
Echo sets the poem of the same name by Christina Rossetti to musicinfor voice and lute.
The music looks to capture the often trance-like feel of the poetry ...the effect, created by Rossetti, of someone lostintheir own thoughts, entirely swept upina memory.
The songsquote other music by Robert Dowland,insome ways mirroring,inothers directly contrasting the existing pieces.
These pieces were originally written to work alongside songs by John Dowland but can also be performed as a complete cycle from start to finish.
The two movements that directly interacted with Dowland Songs are: No. 3, which is designed to run seamlessly out of Weep you no more sad fountains and No. 4 which is designed to run seamlessly out of In darkness let me dwell. If not performing them in this way, simply choose the [mm] text in bar 1 of No. 4.
Ben Rowarth
Duration: 12 minutes
