- Nico Muhly
The Sweets of Evening (2006)
- St. Rose Music Publishing (World)
Commissioned by Brooklyn Youth Chorus.
Programme Note
The Sweets of Evening (2006) was written for Dianne Berkun and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus. Having worked with this group of musicians many times before, I was honored to finally write them a piece. Having sung in a boy choir myself, I am fascinated and intimate with the changing nature of young voices, and I looked for a text that is itself transitory – here, depicting the movement between dusk and night. I have long been a great fan of Christopher Smart’s poetry, and particularly of Benjamin Britten’s setting of fragments from Jubilate Agno; my own setting here nods to Britten in its episodic nature and, I hope, generosity towards the singers. The Sweets of Evening lasts six and one half minutes.