De Profundis
Tenor and Harp
(2013)

Text: Alfred Tennyson, “De Profundis”
Language: English
Duration: 5 minutes

Premiered January 2014
Karim Sulayman, tenor
Alison Attar, harp
Chicago IL

Composer’s Note

One of the most common ambitions for composers involves communicating some musical concept to their audience. What the audience receives is the finished musical product in concert; seldom do they discover the labors that brought that piece to its finished state. This journey from a figment of the composer’s imagination to the final performance is often enigmatic and shrouded in secrecy. Our goal is to enrich that communication and expose the audience to the process of composing, which is unique for every composer, within the context of freshly written works receiving their world premieres.

For this concert/exhibition, six University of Chicago composers saved sketches and documented their process while writing short pieces of chamber music. The premieres were arranged in a three-room exhibit, with a different set of instruments in each room. Sketches of the works and descriptions of how they were written were on display for the audience to view.

“De Profundis” sets the text of a poem by Alfred Tennyson with the same title. The piece explores the pitch content and rhythmic freedom of the liturgical “De Profundis” chant with Tennyson’s text.

Text

Out of the deep, my child, out of the deep,
From that great deep, before our world begins,
Whereon the Spirit of God moves as he will—
Out of the deep, my child, out of the deep,
From that true world within the world we see,
Whereof our world is but the bounding shore—
Out of the deep, Spirit, out of the deep,
With this ninth moon, that sends the hidden sun
Down yon dark sea, thou comest, darling boy.