Composition Details
- Composed by: Claude Debussy
- Published by: Choudens - Paris
- Cat No: 1844943
- Canadian Work: No
Performed in Concert
In Collections
Conductor Notes:
SSA and piano with major soprano solo. This is a classic for women’s choirs by a composer who wrote few choral works in any voicing. The poem was also set by other composers. Written by Debussy at the age of 20, it was originally scored for women’s choir and orchestra, later reduced by Marius Francois Gaillard for piano. The mood is light, fresh, and sentimental. A highly accomplished pianist and an excellent soprano soloist are needed. Time spent ahead of the first rehearsal deciding how to split the voices when the texture changes from 2-voice to 3-voice will save a lot of questions in rehearsal. Also, there are a few places where the assignment of the middle of a 3-note chord is assigned inconsistently between verses.
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Translation:
Greetings Spring! Youthful season. God restores to the plains their glories. The glowing sap, bubbling and seething, bursts from its prison.
The woods and fields are in flower, an invisible world is humming; The water flows over the echoing pebbles and sings a joyous melody.
The hills are golden with blooming gorse, over the green swards the hawthorn scatters its snowy flowers; All is freshness, love and light, and from the fertile breast of the earth rise up songs and perfumes.