Mr. Gioia, my new boss, “asked” me to draw up a mini-program of ten piano-accompanied English-language settings of Shakespeare. I had roughly fifteen minutes to comply. He didn’t tell me why he wanted it. Here’s what I came up with, pretty much straight off the top of my head:
– Thomas Morley, “It was a lover and his lass”
– Gerald Finzi, “It was a lover and his lass” (from Let Us Garlands Bring)
– Joseph Haydn, “She never told her love”
– Franz Schubert, “Who is Sylvia?”
– Erich Wolfgang Korngold, “Desdemona’s Song” (from Four Shakespeare Songs)
– Amy Beach, “O Mistress Mine” (from Three Shakespeare Songs)
– Peter Warlock, “Sigh no more, ladies”
– Roger Quilter, “Come away, Death”
– Stephen Sondheim, “Fear no more the heat o’ the sun” (from The Frogs)
– Dominick Argento, “When icicles hang by the wall” (from Six Elizabethan Songs)
Not bad for a high-pressure improvisation….