Bird of Time (2025)
Soprano solo, SSATB and oboe, strings and percussion or piano accompaniment
Text: Kate Wakeling
Duration: 15 minutes
Commissioned by Henley Choral Society and conductor, Peter Asprey
I O Bird of Time
II Aubade (a lament)
III To Be Bird
In this poignant three-movement work, Cecilia McDowall sets texts by Indian political activist and poet Sarojini Naidu and frequent collaborator Seán Street. With the exquisite beauty of birdsong, often expressed by the obbligato oboe part, at its heart, Bird of Time explores themes of sorrow, loss, and hope for a better future. The opening movement is structured around questions posed to the ‘Bird of Time’ and features richly expressive instrumental interludes. A soprano soloist joins the choir for the second movement, which contrasts the optimism of a dawn chorus with a lament to the plight of the dwindling avian population. The energetic and playful closing movement explores the notion of a ‘bird’s-eye view’ of how humans might appear to these airborne creatures.
Programme Note:
Bird of Time Cecilia McDowall
soprano solo, mixed chorus, oboe, strings and percussion
On receiving this special commission from Ealing Choral Society, to celebrate its 60th anniversary, I was keen to involve the choir in some way. I asked if the singers would share their thoughts on poetic texts with me, something which might suggest a line of inspiration. There were many poems and texts I loved, and it would have been hard to choose from them all, but there was one I was fascinated by: a poem submitted by the Treasurer, Cynthia Haliburn, The Bird of Time by the remarkable Indian political activist, feminist and poet, Sarojini Naidu. And it seemed even more apposite to be setting Sarojini Naidu’s poetry now, during the 75th anniversary of Indian Independence.
After two years of pandemic, and all the difficulties which arose from this time, I think we have become more alive to what we hold most dear. With restrictions imposed on our day-to-day activities in lockdown, many of us took to exercising in the streets; there were few cars, no overhead planes, and in the silence we heard . . . the birdsong; exquisitely beautiful, full of variety and loud! And it is the idea of this precious sound at the heart of the cantata, Bird of Time.
Sarojini Naidu’s poem, The Bird of Time, embraces sorrow, loss and hope for the future. Each verse asks the ‘Bird of Time’ a question, ‘What are the songs you sing?’ In the lines that follow we learn of such poignant contrasts, of joy and despair, of dreams and laughter, of life and death. The movement closes by restating the opening couplet. Life’s full circle, perhaps.
The second movement, Aubade, for soprano solo and chorus is a setting of a poem by Seán Street. Seán and I have collaborated many times before now and it is always a joy to share ideas and work together. I have subtitled Seán’s poem, ‘a lament’. Growing up in the sixties I was very aware of the influence the book Silent Spring by Rachel Carson had on my parents. I can even remember the arresting look of the book with a dead bird on the cover. Rachel Carson, a marine biologist and conservationist, was far ahead of her time. The soprano soloist opens the movement, singing of the dawn chorus which we hear ‘out of darkness, song before flight […] dawn song before everything.’ The chorus picks up the phrase, ‘out of darkness.’ In the second verse the soprano intimates that the avian population is dwindling; this time the chorus sings, ‘into darkness’. In the last verse, ‘silent spring’ has arrived with its ‘haunting silence beyond repair’. The chorus responds, ‘beyond darkness’.
In the last movement, To be bird, we now have a ‘bird’s-eye view’ of how we humans might appear to these airborne creatures. And they are not impressed! When we discussed how this poem might be, Seán related how he had heard, during the pandemic when planes were a rare thing, a nestful of startled chicks squawking at the sudden rush of sound from an aeroplane. In the second verse Seán conjures up some indignation at such a disturbance. The final verse accepts that humans are hopeless; ‘You aspire to be bird? Oh my word – it’s absurd!’
©2022, Cecilia McDowall
1. The Bird of Time
O Bird of Time on your fruitful bough
What are the songs you sing? . . .
Songs of the glory and gladness of life,
Of poignant sorrow and passionate strife,
And the lilting joy of the spring;
Of hope that sows for the years unborn,
And faith that dreams of a tarrying morn,
The fragrant peace of the twilight’s breath,
And the mystic silence that men call death.
O Bird of Time, say where did you learn
The changing measures you sing? . . .
In blowing forests and breaking tides,
In the happy laughter of new-made brides,
And the nests of the new-born spring;
In the dawn that thrills to a mother’s prayer,
And the night that shelters a heart’s despair,
In the sigh of pity, the sob of hate,
And the pride of a soul that has conquered fate.
Sarojini Naidu (1879-1949)
2. Aubade
Air made audible.
Out of darkness,
song before flight, before wing,
dawn song before everything.
Out of darkness.
A music maker
for those who sang,
for the diminishing choir,
less in each unfeathering hour.
Into darkness.
Absence visible,
and morning song
haunting silence beyond repair,
filling space where their voices were
Beyond darkness.
Seán Street (1946)
3. To Be Bird
You aspire to be bird,
beyond word into song,
beyond earth into sky,
but ground makes your sound,
too solid, too rooted
to be part of our choir.
Your thunder and roar,
the noise as you soar,
disturbing our night
and clouding our light
drowns all our protests,
the joy of our nests.
Were you as we, you’d see
how to grow into blue.
we are not here for you
but ourselves, so how can
we teach you the sky,
teach you transparency?
You aspire to be bird?
Oh my word, it’s absurd!
Seán Street (1946)