Blue-Bleak Embers

violin, horn, & piano

Gerard Manley Hopkins

The title comes from the final lines in Gerard Manley Hopkin’s enigmatic poem, “The Windhover.”

Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.

As in the poem, the musical meaning withstands a multi-faceted interpretation. In a literal sense, the physical object, an ember, smolders bleakly with a darkened blue color; the heat obscured within. When the ember is disturbed and eventually broken, a gold-vermillion color erupts and glows with a sparkling intensity. Metaphorically, the poem refers to self and the emotional/ spiritual process of being broken to illuminate something profound.

The music emulates this process, starting with soft, smokey, and subdued sounds. The material is then disturbed and erupts into fiery and agitated gestures. A climactic return to the original material marks a full circle in the cyclic journeys of listening and life.