Millay is one of the first poets I ever set to music. In the fall of the year I set two of her sonnets to music, I was fortunate enough to spend a month at the artist residency at the poet’s estate in upstate New York. It was an enriching experience and one that forever lodged her poetic voice in my ear.

When Tampereen Sävel commissioned this work, there was a general idea that it might be something of a follow up or continuation of music in the spirit of my 2019 Cathedral of Spring. I knew at once that one of the spring-related Millay poems I have been reading all these years would be the topic. Millay’s enriched language is evocative, but, particularly in this poem, leaves a wide berth for one’s own reflection. In my reading of it, I attempted to give the words room to breathe within a musical setting that is equally ambiguous in its affect (or at least it seems so to me). It could be a merely sonorous exploration of the poetry, itself, or the natural world it so beautifully describes, or one could find more pathos or more giddiness in the depths of a range of implied metaphor the poetry and music offers.

Click below to learn more (in Finnish) about Somnium Ensemble and Elisa Huovinen!