Published by Walton Music (GIA)
SATB divisi, unaccompanied
Music by Lane Johnson
Words by Shakespeare (Sonnet XXIX)
Level: Advanced
Duration: ~3:30
Sweet Love Remember'd is a setting of Shakespeare's Sonnet 29. It was commissioned by the Brigham Young University Singers and was premiered that year at the ACDA National Conference. The music complements the poetry with voice leading that allows the choir to move in and out of the richly dense and expressive harmonies.
Suitable for university and other advanced choirs.
When in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heav'n with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,
Desiring this man’s art, and that man’s scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven’s gate.
For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.
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