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Katerina Gimon
Katerina Gimon
Still Stands the Oak (medium voice)
An evocative art song about the resilience of trees and the ancient memories they hold.
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Still Stands the Oak
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Still Stands the Oak
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Songs of Trees
Medium voice and piano
Still Stands the Oak is the final in a set of three songs for voice and piano called Songs of Trees on poems by renowned Canadian Indigenous poet E. Pauline Johnson (1861-1913). This work explores themes of resilience and memory, describing the story of a giant, ancient oak tree that has witnessed countless years of human history. The music weaves in and around a single repeated note in the piano, at once reminiscent of a military drum and a heartbeat, a figure meant to represent the resilience, constancy, and memory held by this ancient tree.
This work was commissioned and premiered by baritone Jason Klippenstein on November 13, 2017, at Roy Barnett Recital Hall (University of British Columbia) in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Vocal range:
High, D4 – A5
Medium, Bb3 – F5
Low, G#3 – D#5
Text
And then the sound of marching armies ‘woke
Amid the branches of the soldier oak,
And tempests ceased their warring cry, and dumb
The lashing storms that muttered, overcome,
Choked by the heralding of battle smoke,
When these gnarled branches beat their martial drum.
Still stands the oak.*
— E. Pauline Johnson [poem: The Giant Oak]
*Note the final line “Still stands the oak” is an addition by the composer.
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