LINDA= LISTER Pleas to Famous Fairies Linda Lister, soprano Amanda Johnston, piano WWW.ALBANYRECORDS.COM TROY1725 ALBANY RECORDS U.S. 915 BROADWAY, ALBANY, NY 12207 TEL: 518.436.8814 FAX: 518.436.0643 ALBANY RECORDS U.K. BOX 137, KENDAL, CUMBRIA LA8 0XD TEL: 01539 824008 © 2018 ALBANY RECORDS MADE IN THE USA DDD WARNING: COPYRIGHT SUBSISTS IN ALL RECORDINGS ISSUED UNDER THIS LABEL. Lister_1725_book.indd 1-2 4/17/18 11:22 AM Bring Me the Wine of Love (Rumi) Open the curtain, my Beloved, (Translation by Azima Melita Kolin and How can I dance? Maryam Mafi, from Rumi Hidden Music, At age 15, I was asked by the director of the University of used with permission) What a loss = Utah’s Young People’s Theatre to compose a new musical version In celebration of the 13th-century mystical What a loss, what a loss, poet, this piece features excerpts in which To be sober in the midst of drunks. of The Little Match Girl. In my naïveté, I didn’t think it was an Rumi references wine, love, and music. Keep on pouring the wine of love until unusual request and soon the word composer was listed by my name All reason dissolves. in the program. My composing continued at Vassar College under Free my heart the mentorship of Professor Annea Lockwood. I did not follow Free my heart from this entanglement O lovers Of search and disappointment O lovers in her footsteps of burning pianos, rather I found my own tonal, Bring me the wine of love Love will lay a carpet of treasures under neo-Romantic voice. Literature has been a longtime inspiration, And my soul will open its wings. your feet. with Shakespeare, Rilke, Rumi, and the Brontë sisters among the You have the perfect cup for every lover. Musicians Love will fill your drums with gold. most frequent muses, although sometimes I have set my own poems I am hopelessly in love with you Thirsty ones to music. I have also enjoyed using occasional musical “inside I am hopelessly in love with you, no point Love will turn your scorched desert jokes” with quotes from great composers ranging from Schubert to In giving me advice. Into a meadow of paradise. I have drunk love’s poison, no point To the parched lips of those who are Tchaikovsky. My vocal writing also reveals a fondness for coloratura, Taking any remedy. Willing to surrender an element not often found in contemporary art song. It has been They want to chain my feet but Love will bring the wine that changes my goal to imbue my compositions with the pathos or humor befit- What’s the point darkness ting the text. In my endeavors as a performer/composer, I enjoy the When it is my heart that’s gone mad! Into vision, and dust into precious incense. ultimate creative synergy of singing my own music and sharing it There is no wine without You I am love’s musician with the world in this very personal way. There is no wine without You, I am love’s musician playing for joy —Linda Lister, February 2018 No use for the rosary without Your hand. I comb the beard of happiness From afar You order me to dance And pull the moustache of sorrow. But unless You set the stage and When my core is touched by music Love’s wine begins to flow. Lister_1725_book.indd 3-4 4/17/18 11:22 AM Pleas to Famous Fairies (Linda Lister) Wanders free, Wave your magic wand, Godmother, With Peter, Peter Pan, Written in 2009 for Laura Collins, these In search of Weaving fairy fantasies. Along with Tiger Lily songs were inspired partially by Zilpha Sylvan synergy. With your diamond star-topped stem, And your not-so-favorite Wendy. Keatley Snyder’s novel The Changeling, You have the power to entrance, You fly, (second star to the right!) which tells the story of a young girl who Queen Titania To conjure shimmering golden gowns, You share your light, doesn’t quite fit in and decides it’s because Hand in hand, with Fairy grace, will we Royal balls, and pure romance. And share the many joys she is a changeling child. Quotes from Wil- sing, and bless this place. With crystal slippers on my feet, Of a pixiepalooza liam Shakespeare, J.M. Barrie, Pyotr Ilyich —William Shakespeare (A Midsummer I’ll dance a dainty minuet With your favorite Lost Boys. Tchaikovsky and Antonín Dvořák salute Night’s Dream, Act V) Close within my prince’s arms, You sprinkle the famous fairies. Joined in single silhouette. Your fairy dust Titania, my queen, oh my fairy So cast your spell, Of shimmer powder pink, Ariel Ambitions queen, Becharm, enchant. And soon, Merrily, merrily shall I live now under the Are you the fairest or the fairiest? Fancify my furtive wanting, All the world can’t help but… blossom that hangs on the bough. Are you pixie or dryad? Nixie or nyad? Add some luster to my longing. Think —William Shakespeare (The Tempest, Act V) Queen of Puck, Pan, or the Peri? Just one wish— Tink! Oh sylphid sovereign, you reign o’er the Grant me this. I aspire to nymph-hood… fey— Rusalka To dance among the sprites, Which ones comprise your chimerical Tink Ah, To frolic with spirits court? Do you believe in fairies? If you believe, Rusalka... In the fairy life. Ariel? Philomel? And what of Tinkerbell? clap your hands! Nymph of the water, A changeling child Surely some new nymphs are needed today! —J. M. Barrie (Peter Pan) Lunar serenader… I must have been, Therefore Titania, your magical majesty, Tink, Your yearning known only by the moon Since my soul hungers Crown me now as your fairy princess Oh, Tink, above, For pixie kin. To flit, to float, to fleet and flourish Oh, Tinkerbell… You harbor honeyed dreams of a mortal My inward imp Within the realm of your royal fancy. I live under your spell… love. Seeks empathy, I clap my hands Oh, And refuge Fairy Godmother For I believe in fairies! What fairy From propriety. I am wistful, wishful, dreamful, I believe you dwell Irony: And so this psyche Ripe with Cinderella dreams. In Never, Never Land You want human happiness Lister_1725_book.indd 5-6 4/17/18 11:22 AM While I seek spritely sweetness. Fairy Thank You Miscellany Courtship Such tenderness my heart has never known, You offer your immortality Both Will Shakespeare and Walt Disney It seems that words cannot describe my So I expect to waken from a dream. For a taste of flesh and fervency, Have made stars of the fairy... heart, But as your warmth envelops my frail soul, But you know not the power of earthly Let us not forget, Although I feel the need to understand How perfect and how pure the world does pain, Lest we regret, This coy, consuming thought. seem! The magical frailty of things humane. There are still a few I will impart, strangely enough, my plight And as dreams turn to actuality, Yet, We should mention, too: involves a man. Reality becomes sweet fantasy. Your silver nocturne enchants my soul The Tooth Fairy who reimbursed us The issue is of that which is implied, To cherish the wish that renders me whole. For our dental deliveries, Be it in smile, in touch, in sigh or glance. Consequence I may not see eternity, like you, The Sugar Plum Fairy who dances so sweetly One needs the insight of a neutral mind Within me stirs a pain beyond compare, But my love, he is lifelong, real, and true. In our Nutcracker memories, Or else ideas will quickly be entranced. An ache which haunts me even as I sleep. The Blue Fairy who gave a puppet Bur reason is impossible to see Because I know that you no longer care, Sookie Stackhouse The chance to be a boy, When romance serenades a lonely soul. My blood becomes the tears my heart does Sookie Stackhouse is a fairy! And The Lilac Fairy whose magic Thus he, the wooing poet, holds the key weep. Sookie Stackhouse: Let a Sleeping Beauty wake to joy. For only he can play the leader’s role. I live within the memory of your touch What a silly, silly name. Oh, thank you, one and all, dear fairies, Albeit so, the prospect it not dim And drown in the denial of my loss. It has so many sibilants. For granting wishes If she, the courted, versifies love for him. But my delusion only does so much Although alliteration is okay. And princes’ kisses, And cannot quell forsaken love’s cruel frost. Fitting fairy names are And making dreams realities. Consummation Abiding in my own uncherished soul, Peaseblossom, Mustardseed, A single image doth consume my mind I mourn the part of me he took away. Silvermist, Dewberry. A Sonnetress Enamored (Linda Lister) Encompassing both pleasure and despair. I look to time and space to take control, Not Sookie, nor Snookie. These poems, and later this song cycle, were Within this thought, tranquility I find, For they alone my suffering can allay. A telepathic barmaid from Bon Temps, written during the composer’s time at Vassar For when I close my eyes, I see you there. And when my self-regard has been retrieved, She loves the vampire Bill Compton. College. The instrumental part, originally Sweet sights remain as I recall your face, Perhaps the course of love will then True Love, True Blood. scored for flute, is meant to represent the And on my lips I feel a lingering kiss.