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Elizabeth Alexander
Elizabeth Alexander (Seafarer Press)
Immortal Love
An elegantly sculpted chorale about eternal and abiding love.
SATB a cappella
A contemplative setting of John Greenleaf Whittier’s beloved poem on the boundless, enduring nature of divine love. With a plaintive melody, haunting modal harmony, and compelling inner voices, this deceptively simple chorale brings forth a sense of timeless awe and wonder.
Composer’s Notes
Everything about John Greenleaf Whittier’s poem “Immortal Love” is timeless. Its eight short lines overflow with transcendent words like “forever,” eternal,” and “never-ending.” When I was considering setting this lyric, I realized the music would need to suggest nothing less than the Truth beyond all human understanding.
Yeah, right.
At the time I was setting Whittier’s poem to music, I was mom to two young and very active boys. Their bodies ran headlong through the world, and their curious minds were clicking and sparking every minute of the day. When I thought of words like “never-ending,” what generally came to mind was laundry and dirty dishes. So when I sat down at the piano to work on this song I had to consciously move myself into a still place.
It wasn’t easy. I would periodically close my eyes and take long breaths. I repeatedly reminded myself that the most profound music is often the most simple music. At the same time, I wanted every voice part to listen deeply to every other voice part, so that they would move through time and space in an interconnected way. One week of composing turned into two, and then three. How could I possibly spend so much time on a fourteen measure piece? But every day I kept sitting at the piano and closing my eyes and taking deep breaths, until one day I made the last small adjustment and there it was: A luminous braid of silken cords.
It’s an illusion, of course, as is all art. If there is any small suggestion of “the Truth beyond human understanding” in my setting of “Immortal Love,” it’s still just a suggestion, a clumsy reminder that beyond the boundaries of our small lives there exists some incomprehensible beauty and order. But the act of composing this song gave me a small glimpse of that incomprehensible thing. Hopefully it might do the same for you.
-Elizabeth Alexander
Text
Immortal love, forever full, forever flowing free.
Forever shared, forever whole, a never-ending sea.
Our outward lips confess the name all other names above,
but love alone knows whence it came and comprehendeth love.
Blow winds of love, awake and blow the mists of hate away,
Sing out, O Truth divine, and tell how wide and far we stray.
The letter fails, the systems fall, and every symbol wanes;
The Spirit overseeing all, Eternal Love, remains.
-John Greenleaf Whittier
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