Winter’s Grace

Conductor Notes:

SSAA (div) a cappella. Marked “serenely” and quarter = 58, I found we needed to move the tempo to keep the sense of the phrases. A fairly low tessitura, so probably not suited to children’s or youth choirs.

Text

The mountain birches,
straight and strong,

welcome the snow’s
white winter song.

Their bare twigs sift
flakes thick and thin

to coat the ground
like powdered skin,

hiding autumn’s
leafy bed

as storm winds shift
then soothe instead.

Just so, heaven’s grace
falls soft, blows strong

on you, on me,
our whole year long.

From: The Slow Pleasures by Luci Shaw