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JONATHAN COLE (b. 1970)Sorful Ter (1997, revised 2001)

This chapter focuses on British composer Jonathan Cole’s Sorful Ter (1997, revised 2001). This pair of settings of complementary medieval poems displays Cole’s strong compositional persona and sensitivity to atmosphere. The two songs are extremely moving, unified by the fact that the same character, the Virgin Mary, is singing. In the first (‘The Virgin’s Song’), she bemoans in a lullaby the poverty-stricken fate of her baby son, and in the second (‘Lovely Tear of Lovely Eye’), she agonizes over his death. The musical treatment, however, is markedly different. The first song is relatively straightforward and intimate in feeling, but the second is elaborate in the extreme—teeming with decorations, trills, grace notes, and intricate rhythms. Both performers are given a highly satisfying task. The pianist will be kept fully exercised, with a wealth of bravura passages and piercing rhythmic patterns. Despite the atonality of the idiom, the composer frequently returns to an anchoring base note, even amongst the most florid vocal lines, and this will help the singer’s orientation.