Dust of Snow (2020)

I wrote this short piece for the community choir I run, the boiler house singers. It was in the middle of the pandemic and we were rehearsing by zoom during the lockdown. We decided to have a Christmas concert of sorts online and I wrote this piece, Setting Robert Frost’s poem a dust of snow. Joining our choir was filmmaker Jeanie Finlay, whose husband, Steven Sheil, is a writer. We felt that the song was short with only one verse and by the end of the rehearsal Jeanie had sent us a new verse, by Steven.

Score available on request.

The way a crow
Shook down on me,
The dust of snow
From the Hemlock tree

Has given my heart
A change of mood,
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued.

A winter’s stroll,
Through the darkening wood,
Has saved the toll,
That would have stood.