"Ferry me across the Water" [Ned Rorem]

"Ferry me across the Water" [Ned Rorem]

First line of lyrics: Ferry me across the water

Part of: "The Nantucket Songs"

Rorem, Ned; music (American, born 1923)

Rossetti, Christina Georgina; text (English, 1830-1894)

1981 [publication] [copyright]

New York: Boosey & Hawkes, Inc.

genre: art song (lied)|song|song cycle

solo: voice

instrumentation: piano

initial sharps/flats: seven sharps

initial time signature: 4/4

origin: United States

male composer

English

Rossetti poem(s): "'Ferry me across the water'"

Place in the larger work: The ninth song of ten in the song cycle called "Nantucket Songs" which includes 1. "From Whence Cometh Song?" (Theodore Roethke); 2. "The Dance" (William Carlos Williams); 3. "Nantucket" (William Carlos Williams); 4. "Go, Lovely Rose" (Edmund Waller); 5. "Up-Hill" (Christina Rossetti); 6. "Mother, I Cannot Mind my Wheel" (Walter Savage Landor); 7. "Fear of Death" (John Ashbery); 8. "Thoughts of a Young Girl" (John Ashbery); 9. "Ferry Me Across the Water" (Christina Rossetti); 10. "The Dancer" (Edmund Waller).

Composition history: A note on the score states that "the cycle was commissioned by the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Foundation. It was composed between November, 1978 and May, 1979 on the island of Nantucket, hence the title. An apt subtitle might be 'Popular Songs', insofar as "Popular" means "entertaining" as opposed to "classically" indirect. Indeed, these songs -- merry or complex or strange though their texts may seem -- aim away from the head and toward the diaphragm. They are, as collegians say, emotional rather than intellectual, and need not to be understood to be enjoyed."

Tempo markings: Very very languorous; quarter note = 48

Performance history: First public and broadcast performance was by soprano Phyllis Bryn-Julson with Ned Rorem at the piano, at the Coolidge Auditorium of the Library of Congress, October 30, 1979.

Recordings: Rorem, Ned. Ned Rorem: The Nantucket Songs and Other Songs. Performance of the Nantucket Songs by Phyllis Bryn-Julson, soprano, Ned Rorem, piano as it was first broadcasted at the Library of Congress, Composers Recordings, Inc.1993; CD, Anthology of Recorded Music, Inc., 2007. New World Records, http://www.newworldrecords.org/album.cgi?rm=view&album_id=17439. (Rorem)

Notes: Republished in "Song Album: Ned Rorem," volume 3.

Format 1: musical score

1 page (p. 24)

Cataloguer: Roxanne Lafleur, University of Ottawa

musical score: Peter Turkstra Library, Redeemer University College, Hamilton

Record: CRM-ferrymeacross-rorem

"Copyright 1981 by Boosey & Hawkes, Inc."

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