From a Pandemic Garden (2021)
four songs for soprano and piano
Score available for purchase at JW Pepper and Sheet Music Plus. See below for details.
1. California Rose
2. Wooded Dell
3. Garden Teahouse
4. February 2021
(Nancy Bachmann – words and music)
Title: From a Pandemic Garden
Instrumentation: soprano, piano
Date of Composition: 2021
Duration: 15 minutes
Program Note
From a Pandemic Garden is a collection of songs I wrote while "sheltered in place" during the COVID-19 pandemic. My world was my house and walled garden; each spot a potential for inspiration, sparking ideas for songs to while away the months of waiting.
California Rose is a playful portrait of one of my favorite flowers.
A group of pine trees created a Wooded Dell, a song exploring the timelessness of romance.
An Asian lantern inspired Garden Teahouse, a story told through Haiku.
February 2021 links the hope of the early California springtime with the poignant optimism inspired by the availability of the first COVID vaccines
I. California Rose
Never underestimate a California rose!
Her loveliness will break your heart,
Her thorns can tear you life apart,
Approach with caution, awe, respect, every wise man knows!
Her flirty dress at Easter-time will never be outdone!
Her fashion sense is truly awesome;
Shining leaf and painted blossom,
Flashing colors that could blind you in the California sun!
She’ll blow a kiss on perfumed breath for you alone, it seems.
A fragrance that can numb the mind,
Sweet and tart as Napa wine,
Her scent will linger in the air and haunt your summer dreams.
The slow, seductive opening of bud to fullest flow’r;
Each velvet petal, soft and light
As wings of dragonflies in flight
Cleverly conceals the secret of her staying pow’r.
When New York roses fall asleep with naked stem and thorn,
And every other dormant rose
Demurely dozes ‘neath the snows,
The California rose is known to bloom on Christmas morn!
Wherever you encounter her, she’ll strike a willful pose;
Climbing over garden walls,
Holding court in banquet halls,
Oh, never underestimate a California rose!
II. Wooded Dell
Oh, come with me, my own true love,
Down into the wooded dell.
There we'll beg the dappled shade
To cast again its leafy spell.
Let Time relinquish its control
As hours, blurred by muted light,
Mix memories with promises,
Heedless of the coming night.
Your heart and mine, my own true love,
Will pulse a pattern we know well:
Now as then, and then as now
Down within the wooded dell.
III. Garden Teahouse
Nature's canvas grows
green upon green upon green
Love views the garden
One porcelain cup
fragrant steam circles around
fragile budding dreams
Love watches unseen
the loved one strolling alone
each step a promise
But who now appears?
furtive familiar kisses
shade sheltered passion
Jealousy's eyes glow
green upon green upon green
shattered cup and dreams
IV. February 2021
Why do I cry when crocuses bloom?
Why weep at daffodils?
Springtime’s salty sweetness fills my eyes with dew.
Bleak and barren winter harbors beauties of her own,
But not the type that wrings the heart for tears.
Here the sunlight, bright and white,
Ignites each flash of green
On every bush and tree within my garden wall.
Hope, hope and promise.
I weep for happy when the crocus blooms!
From a Pandemic Garden