Tag: inspired by landscape

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Mercy On Ourselves (2025)

SATB Choir. 5 mins.

Commissioned by Emmanuel Music.

Perusal Score

View perusal score.

Score available for purchase. Please direct inquiries to Nell Shaw Cohen at nell@nellshawcohen.com.

Program Note

J.S. Bach’s cantata Schauet doch und sehet, ob irgend ein Schmerz sei (BWV 46) finds the composer and his anonymous librettist exploring the biblical premise that humankind invites destruction upon itself through its misdeeds. This cantata gives voice to sorrow experienced in the wake of widespread devastation, and urges humanity to seek divine mercy or suffer God’s wrath—so powerfully evoked here in Bach’s depictions of extreme weather, particularly in the stormy bass aria.

Viewing Bach’s cantata through a contemporary lens, I am struck by its parallels to today’s climate crisis. Scientists have reported that 2024 was the warmest year on record, and the first year in which the global temperature has exceeded 1.5°C above the pre-industrial level (per the European Union’s Copernicus Programme). The large-scale degradation of our environment, and the violent processes of climate change that result, such as extreme weather, are the very real and present manifestation of humankind in the process of sowing its own destruction.

In this motet commissioned by Emmanuel Music, I seek to offer a musical meditation on the climate crisis that takes its cues from Bach’s moving evocations of human sorrow and divine wrath. Inspired by the overarching emotional and musical shape of Bach’s cantata—characterized by intense contrasts highlighted in the opening lamentation and wrathful fugue, the storm bass aria, and the closing chorale—my piece is structured into three brief, contrasting sections.

The opening stanza of my lyrics, built from paraphrases of Bach’s opening passage from Lamentations, expresses the sorrow that many of us feel; and in particular, the paradox of experiencing collective suffering as a personal grief within our individual, isolated lives. Emphasis and repetition on the word “sorrow” pays tribute to Bach’s mesmerizing treatment of the German Schmerz. 

The work’s contrapuntal middle section evokes the destructive powers of our climate out-of-balance, recounting natural forces and extreme weather events that Earth has experienced with increasing frequency and intensity in the recent past.

The final section takes the form of a heartfelt prayer for mercy. In my work, this prayer is directed not to the divine but instead towards human civilization itself: a plea to the collective to change our course, to have mercy on ourselves by using the tools and knowledge that our global society has within its grasp to reform our relationship to the planet.

Text

Be there sorrow like my sorrow?
(Grief for the past)
Is your sorrow like my sorrow?
(Grief for the present)
Is this sorrow all our sorrow?
(Grief for the future—
My, your, our future)

Wind, water, air, and land
Heat, fire, ice, and snow
We are at their mercy
Cyclone, hurricane, flooding, freeze
Landslide, wildfire, hunger, drought
We are at their mercy
Please show us mercy

We must show mercy
To mend our sorrow
We know what we need
But will it be done?
(Wind, water, air, and land
Heat, fire, ice, and snow)

We must show mercy
To mend our planet
We know that we could
But will it be done?
(Cyclone, hurricane, flooding, freeze
Landslide, wildfire, hunger, drought)

We know what we need
We know it could be done
We must show mercy
Please, we must show mercy on ourselves
And will it to be done

“Mercy On Ourselves” Copyright © 2024 Nell Shaw Cohen.

Performance History

Emmanuel Music (Ryan Turner, Director), Emmanuel Church, Boston, MA, 3/16/25.

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Proofs of Coming Fullness (2024)

Tenor and piano. 4 mins.

Text by Walt Whitman.

Perusal Score

View perusal score.

Score available for purchase. Please direct inquiries to Nell Shaw Cohen at nell@nellshawcohen.com.

Program Note

“In his 1882 autobiography Specimen Days, Walt Whitman penned a series of vividly observed miniature prose pieces documenting his impressions of the natural world. Excerpted from an entry dated April 6, the text of Proofs of Coming Fullness describes an early spring morning in which Whitman observes signs of seasonal change. This song was composed as a complementary work to my operatic monodrama The Coming of Spring— which also highlights the phenomena of early spring, as depicted in the art and journals of Charles E. Burchfield —and for World Premiere in conjuction with the Burchfield Penney Art Center’s exhibit Embracing Earth: Burch􏰄eld & Whitman.”

Text

“I am sitting in bright sunshine, at the edge of the creek, the surface just rippled by the wind. All is solitude, morning freshness, negligence. […] Then a poor little dead leaf, long frost-bound, whirls from somewhere up aloft in one wild escaped freedom-spree in space and sunlight, and then dashes down to the waters, which hold it closely and soon drown it out of sight. The bushes and trees are yet bare, but the beeches have their wrinkled yellow leaves of last season’s foliage largely left, frequent cedars and pines yet green, and the grass not without proofs of coming fullness. And over all a wonderfully fine dome of clear blue, the play of light coming and going, and great fleeces of white clouds swimming so silently.”

From “Specimen Days” (1882) by Walt Whitman.

Performance History

Burchfield Penney Art Center,  Buffalo Opera Unlimited (Joe Dan Harper, tenor and Matthew Marco, piano), Buffalo, NY, 8/4/24.

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The Open Road (2023/Arr. 2024)

Tenor and piano. 3 mins.

A selection from Sauntering Songs: a concert-length cantata on the theme of walking, commissioned by Skylark Vocal Ensemble.

Text by Walt Whitman.

Perusal Score

View perusal score.

Score available for purchase. Please direct inquiries to Nell Shaw Cohen at nell@nellshawcohen.com.

Program Note

“The Open Road” is a selection from Sauntering Songs: a concert-length cantata on the theme of walking, commissioned by Skylark Vocal Ensemble. This selection, which forms the opening number of the work, sets excerpts from Walt Whitman’s invigorating “Poem of The Road.” Originally scored for SATB choir with an instrumental quartet of flute, piano, electric guitar, and cello, the song is presented here in a reduced arrangement for solo tenor and piano.

Text

Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road!
Healthy, free, the world before me!
The long brown path before me, leading wherever
I choose!

The earth expanding right hand and left hand, the picture alive, every part in its best light, the music falling in where it is wanted, and
stopping where it is not wanted,
The cheerful voice of the public road—the gay
fresh sentiment of the road.

From this hour, I ordain myself loosed of limits and imaginary lines!
Going where I list—my own master, total and absolute,

Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road!
Healthy, free, the world before me!
The long brown path before me, leading wherever
I choose!

The cheerful voice of the public road—the gay fresh sentiment of the road.

The open road!

Excerpt from “Poem of The Road” by Walt Whitman, from Leaves of Grass (1856 edition).

Performance History

Burchfield Penney Art Center,  Buffalo Opera Unlimited (Joe Dan Harper, tenor and Matthew Marco, piano), Buffalo, NY, 8/4/24.

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The Fire Tower (2023)

An opera in one act for soprano, mezzo-soprano, and piano. 24 mins.

Black & white photograph of a fire tower on a mountain summit

Two intrepid women develop a bond of friendship during a trek deep into the wilderness. June, a first-time fire lookout, is radically reinventing herself following the unexpected death of her life partner. Ray is an experienced mule packer with a life-long love for the land, who struggles with hopelessness in the face of ecological crises.

Accompanied by pack mules, Ray guides June to her seasonal post at a rustic fire tower on a mountain summit in a non-motorized wilderness. During their journey the women are awed by vast landscapes, find moments of levity, and share their experiences with grief.

Set against a backdrop of climate crisis in the American West, The Fire Tower is an intimate portrait of two people in a pivotal moment searching for purpose.

Music & libretto by Nell Shaw Cohen.

Perusal Score

Available for workshop productions. Perusal score provided on request. Please direct inquiries to Nell Shaw Cohen at nell@nellshawcohen.com.

Performance & Development History


UTSA Lyric Theatre presented a workshop performance of The Fire Tower directed by Jourdan Laine Howell at The University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, TX, 11/17 & 11/19/23.

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Where the Buffalo Roam (2016/arr. 2023)

Flute, violin, and cello. 6 ½ mins.

A new arrangement of a selection from wildlife conservation suite Refuge.

Live recording of the World Premiere by Juventas New Music Ensemble (Nicholas Southwick, flute; Ryan Shannon, violin; and Matthew Smith, cello):

Perusal Score

View perusal score.

Performance score and parts available for purchase. Please direct inquiries to Nell Shaw Cohen at nell@nellshawcohen.com.

Program Note

“Where the Buffalo Roam” is a newly arranged selection from  Refuge: a narrative suite following the conservation stories of wild animals in National Parks. Each of these species offers a different perspective from which to reflect upon the National Park Service’s role in wildlife conservation and the diversity and fragility of life on Earth. I composed the piece for World Premiere by Cadillac Moon Ensemble at the Parrish Art Museum in 2016, in commemoration of the centennial year of the National Park Service.

Appearing on the official arrowhead emblem of the National Park Service and the seal of the Department of the Interior, the American bison (commonly known as the “buffalo”) is this country’s symbol for conservation and national parks. Designated as the first national mammal of the United States, bison also have an iconic cultural importance for America, rooted in their centrality to indigenous peoples and their role in early pioneer culture.

Bison have one of the most successful and controversial narratives of wildlife conservation, steeped in a history of tensions between violence and protection, oppression and collaboration, loss and triumph, and private and public interests. Through the story of the American bison, we find many key thematic threads of the greater American experience.

In “Where the Buffalo Roam,” I sought to create a highly condensed musical narrative depicting moments from the history of the bison in Yellowstone National Park. This piece is built around a quotation from the nostalgic pioneer song, “Home On the Range” (“Oh, give me a home where the Buffalo roam”), which was written in the 1870s by Brewster Higley and popularized by Bing Crosby and Gene Autry, among others. Through my piece, I transform a snippet of this sentimental tune through three sections to evoke a condensed glimpse of the bison’s history.

In the first section, Wild, I utilize glassy sul tasto strings and a quiet, gently rhythmic texture to envision the bison in its prehistoric state: balanced, roaming free, hunted and venerated by the Great Plains tribes. The arrival of homesick pioneers soon gives way to the second section, Hunted: aggressive scalar runs suggest the mass hunting of bison by pioneers and the U.S. Army. The near-extinction of the bison is conveyed by a sudden thinning of texture to a series of soft, eerie chords. Out of this nadir builds Renewed, culminating in a final, full expression of the “Home In the Range” melody. This ending suggests a hopeful vision for bison’s flourishing today in Yellowstone and a future in which we might someday live in balance with wild nature.

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Performance History
  • Juventas New Music Ensemble, The Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA, 7/16/23.

Visit the Refuge page for the performance history of this selection as part of the complete suite in its original scoring for quartet.

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Lament for the Land (2023)

Flute, violin, and cello. 4 mins.

Live recording of the World Premiere by Juventas New Music Ensemble (Nicholas Southwick, flute; Ryan Shannon, violin; and Matthew Smith, cello):

Perusal Score

View perusal score.

Performance score and parts available for purchase. Please direct inquiries to Nell Shaw Cohen at nell@nellshawcohen.com.

Program Note

Lament for the Land expresses the grief many of us feel over humanity’s broken relationship with our environment, and the hopeful yearning for a healed Earth that guides our actions. Adapted from music originally composed for an opera with libretto by Mashuq Mushtaq Deen.

Related Content
Performance History
  • Juventas New Music Ensemble, The Clark Art Institute, Williamstown, MA, 7/16/23.