War

WAR is the first of three pieces that I wrote for the UCD (University College Dublin) Choral Scholars, directed by Desmond Earley. This “Irish Trilogy” centers on three key elements: War, Peace and Aimhirgin. This setting for mixed choir and oboe is taken from a beautiful poem by Francis Ledwidge. I composed the piece on the Greek island of Tinos, where I have vacationed in the summer for many years. While War is a poem that speaks of darkness, storm, and thunder, Tinos is quiet and peaceful. Actually, the poem had nothing to do with what I was experiencing in Tinos – namely sunshine, wonderful weather, the quiet sea and peaceful atmosphere! Yet, the final sentence of the poem is: I am the epic of the sea, and this quote is definitely in tune with Greece. The Greek sea was quite helpful and inspired me greatly.

Ivo Antognini

Acknowledgements

This commission project was made possible by the generosity of more than eighty individual donors through Irish crowd-funding website Fundit.ie. University College Dublin Choral Scholars would like to express our sincere thanks to these donors for bringing this project to life. The names of the donors are listed below. Finally, the choir would like to thank the team at Fundit.ie and Business to Arts (Ireland), for their help and support in running this crowdfunding campaign.

University College Dublin Choral Scholars would like to offer special thanks to the Embassy of Switzerland in Ireland, who also made a special donation to this project. We are very grateful for this support.

In addition to the names above, there were four anonymous donations made to the Fundit campaign.

recording performed by UCD Choral Scholars, University College Dublin
Dublin, Ireland
Desmond Earley, Director

Click here to see a sample.

Click here to listen to a recording (MP3).