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About the Score

Emily Dickinson's text so humbly evokes a longing that many of us have felt as we search for purpose and for a way to offer some good to our terrestrial community. Through this longing, comfortingly, her sentiment conveys positivity: that making even one small gesture to help one fellow soul is enough to justify one's time spent in the world.

In my setting of this text, I attempt to capture a questioning individual's yearning to find their own faith in Dickinson's message. The first half of this piece ruminates over just the first four lines of text until, perhaps, a fortunate real-life encounter with a robin in need uplifts this individual by granting the mental turning point that they needed.

"I Shall Not Live in Vain” was commissioned by Choral Arts Initiative (Brandon Elliott, Artistic Director) for the 2018 PREMIERE|Project Festival.

Featured on the Choral Arts Initiative Series on MusicSpoke.

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