Christina Rossetti In Music

Christina Rossetti in Music Project

"Your Birthday" [Elizabeth R. Austin]

Title

"Your Birthday" [Elizabeth R. Austin]
First line of lyrics: My heart is like a singing bird
Part of: "Birthday Bouquet"

Creator

Austin, Elizabeth R.; music (American, a.k.a. Elizabeth Scheidel, born 1938)
Rossetti, Christina Georgina; text (English, 1830-1894)

Date

1990 [composition]

Publisher

New York: American Composers Alliance

Subject

genre: song|song cycle
solo: high voice
instrumentation: piano
initial sharps/flats: no sharps or flats
initial time signature: 3/4
origin: United States
female composer

Language

English

Description

Rossetti poem(s): "A Birthday"
Place in the larger work: The second song in a song cycle called "Birthday Bouquet," which includes 1. "for your birthday" (e e cummings); 2. "Your Birthday" (Christina Rossetti); 3. "Remember" (Christina Rossetti); 4. "He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven" (W.B. Yeats)
Tempo markings: "Andante con moto"; quarter note = 63
Recordings: "A Birthday Bouquet." Lyrics by Christina Rossetti, e.e. cummings, and W.B. Yeats, performance by Susan Gonzalez, soprano, and Marcia Eckert, piano. Songs by Women, Leonarda Productions, 2002, https://www.discogs.com/Susan-Gonzalez-Marcia-Eckert-Songs-By-Women/release/8292648. Accessed 14 January 2019.
Dedication: "for Gerhard"
Notes: Program notes for the score, written by the composer, mention that "different ostinato patterns link" this setting with the first song in the cycle, "for your birthday." The composer goes on to write that the piece, which is "full of sun and shadow, contains a brief quote from Hugo Wolf's 'Gesang Weylas' (from 'Morikelieder'), a personal 'dream picture' shared by my husband and myself." As the lyrics do not contain any changes from Rossetti's original text, the "quote" Phillips mentions must be musical.

Format

Format 1: musical score
4 pages (pp. 6-9); song cycle performance time 9 minutes

Source

Other data reference(s): Austin, Elizabeth R. "List of Works - Discography - Publications." Elizabeth R. Austin. 2016, http://www.elizabethaustinmusic.com/home-page.html. Accessed 14 Jan. 2019.
"BIRTHDAY BOUQUET." American Composers Alliance, https://composers.com/composition/birthday-bouquet. Accessed 14 Jan. 2019.
Cataloguer: Sarah Pennington, University of Ottawa
musical score: University of Ottawa Library, Ottawa, Canada

Identifier

Record: CRM-birthday-austin

Rights

The Christina Rossetti in Music project website is hosted in Canada at the University of Ottawa Library, and we aim to comply with Canadian copyright laws. If you believe we have violated Canadian copyright law, please contact us at christinarossettimusic@uottawa.ca. The Christina Rossetti in Music project is strictly not for profit and intended for research and educational purposes only.

Files

CRM-no-score-available-copyright-protected.jpg

Collection

Citation

Austin, Elizabeth R.; music (American, a.k.a. Elizabeth Scheidel, born 1938) and Rossetti, Christina Georgina; text (English, 1830-1894), “"Your Birthday" [Elizabeth R. Austin],” Christina Rossetti In Music, accessed November 21, 2024, http://omeka.uottawa.ca/christinarossettiinmusic/items/show/2226.

Item Relations

This Item is part of a larger work that also includes Item: "Remember" [Elizabeth R. Austin]