words for sometime

1993 (REVISED 2021)

SOPRANO & PIANO

Words For Sometime is a collection of two songs — Sunset On Mount Hope and Alone. They are amongst some of my earliest compositions, written and recorded when I was a postgraduate piano and composition student at the Royal Scottish Academy Of Music and Drama in Glasgow (now the Royal Conservatoire Of Scotland).

In the early 1990s I was immersed in the piano music of Debussy and Ravel, while deeply in love with the music of the Cocteau Twins — a musical love affair that exists to this day. In Words For Sometime, the Debussy/Ravel influence is clearly notable in the piano writing and my non-literal lyrics point to the influence and magical world of Elizabeth Fraser — vocalist and lyricist of the Cocteau Twins. My workings with non-literal language continue in my songwriting today.

Words For Sometime was written especially for Scottish soprano Lisa Milne, a fellow music student at the RSAMD prior to her sensational career as an international opera singer and recitalist.

During Lockdown 2020 I revised the collection and transcribed the original handwritten scores to digital copy.