Nouvelle Chant des Oyseaulx SSAATTBB - Digital Sheet Music

SKU: A0.1483617

This work was composed for In Clara Voce and Piffaro. The current version is a for divisi a capella choir. Aleatoric instructions help the performers to weave a canopy of avian sound. There is no direct quotation of Jannequin or even of a precise birsong except the cukoo as represented in a song from an early 15th c. chansonnier.

The Cambridge Songs, No. 23 (“Vestiunt silve”)

Translated by Kevin Tsai

Forests clothe Gloom with tender boughs,

Laden with fruits;

From heaven-high perches the pigeons sing

Songs to one and all.


Here the dove moans softly, here echoes the thrush,

Here the blackbird rings out with his olden airs—

Nor can the sparrow keep quiet, laughing in chatter,

High underneath the elm.



Here a nightingale sings, delighting in leaves,

And pours her warbling through lasting wind—

Solemnly. And with trilling cries the kite makes

Heaven shake.



Starward soars an eagle; in wind

The lark sings, freeing its melodies,

And swooping down from the blue in a changed key,

It touches earth.



The swallow swift utters a ringing call,

The quail clucks, the jackdaw jargons.

Birds celebrate like so— for all,

Everywhere, Summersong.


None among birds is like the bee.

None is Chastity more Perfect,

Save She who bore Christ in Her Womb,

Inviolate.