All the Way Home

Saturday, January 25, 2025
5:00 pm
Binkley Sanctuary

Dear Listener,
Thank you for coming!

Today we bring you music that explores the ideas of Home and Memories.
We celebrate the places we love, places we belong.
And we celebrate the family and friends who have helped create a sense of Home for us, and helped us grow into the people we are today.
We celebrate both those that continue our journeys with us and those we’ve had to bid farewell.

Our hearts are with those who have recently lost their homes to fires and storms and violence, whose sense of Home has been disrupted, and who fear losing their homes and having to separate from their families, friends, and communities in the coming times. 

Thank you for sharing this evening with us.

Be Like the Bird

Words by Victor Hugo
Music by Abbie Betinis

Fly Away Home

Words and Music by PINKZEBRA

In This Ancient House,
Momoshiki Ya

Anonymous Japanese poem
Music by Ruth Morris Gray

We have imagined revisiting a house that we lived in long ago, finding it overgrown with moss and ferns, and revisiting the many memories that the house holds for us.

I Remember

Words and Music by Sarah Quartel

Winter Song

Words and Music by Sara Bareilles and Ingrid Michaelson
Arr. Mac Huff

Hope Lingers On

Words and Music by Lissa Schneckenburger
Arr. Andrea Ramsey

Vichten

Words by Arthur Arsenault
Music by Angèle Arsenault
Arranged by Hart Rouge

From the editor:
The Acadians are a vibrant and distinct French culture in the Canadian mosaic, descended from settlers mainly from Northern France who first arrived in 1604 to the area known today as southwest Nova Scotia. After building communities throughout Canada’s east coast provinces, the Acadians were expulsed from their lands by the British colonial authorities from 1755 ot 1763, and their homes and crops burned. Over 10,000 Acadians were deported to various parts of the world, some of whom settled in Louisiana where, over time, the word ‘Acadian’ – as spoken in the Acadian patois – was understood by English language speakers as ‘Cajun.’ Today, Acadian culture is thriving, and music is a huge part of everyday life. It is not uncommon for everyone in a traditional Acadian family to sing and play an instrument! 

Many people in Canada mistake “Vichten” as a traditional Acadian folk song. It is not. It is a newly composed folk song that was written by Arthur Arsenault for his children and made popular by his daughter Angèle Arsenault. Angèle … recorded and performed “Vichten” throughout her long career as an Acadian folk singer and TV host.

The words of “Vichten” are made up of nonsense syllables, similar to Scottish “mouth music” where the voices are intended to mimic instruments.

All the Pretty Little Horses

from Four American Folk Songs
by Frank Ferko

As you sing

Words and Music by Sarah Quartel

Come again

John Dowland

Come again, sweet love doth now invite
thy graces that refrain to do me due delight,
to see, to hear, to touch, to kiss, to die
with thee again in sweetest sympathy.

Come again, that I may cease to mourn,
through thy unkind distain, for now left and forlorn
I sit, I sigh, I weep, I faint, I die
in deadly pain and endless misery.

Kaleidoscope Heart

Words and Music by Sarah Bareilles
Arr. Allison Girvan

Yesterday

Words and Music by John Lennon and Paul McCartney
Arr. Tom Gentry

Kira! (Count!)

Words and Music by Tracy Wong

From the composer:
This playful composition for 3-part treble choir and percussion is a nod to Malay folk songs that merge counting/play (common in some childhood games) and sage advice. It also celebrates elders in my larger Malaysian community who impart life teachings to young people in a fun and accessible way. I am drawn to this tradition for its beauty in having music as a form of intergenerational community building.

Wanting Memories

Words and Music by Y—saÿe M. Barnwell

All the way home

Text written and inspired by members of the Radcliffe Ladies’ Choir as they reflected on their motto, “friendship through singing”
Piece by Sarah Quartel

Shenandoah

United States Folk Song
arranged for Sisters’ Voices by Leandra and Sisters’ Voices singers over the years

O Shenandoah, I long to see you,
Away, you rolling river.
O Shenandoah, I long to see you,
Away, I’m bound away, cross the wide Missouri.

I long to see your smiling valley
And hear your rolling river.
I long to see your smiling valley,
Away, I’m bound away, cross the wide Missouri.

O Shenandoah, I love your daughter!
Away, you rolling river.
O Shenandoah, I love your daughter!
Away, I’m bound away, cross the wide Missouri.

‘Tis seven long years since last I’ve seen you,
Away, you rolling river.
‘Tis seven long years since last I’ve seen you,
Away, I’m bound away, cross the wide Missouri.

Shenandoah is a beautiful folk song that we return to over and over because it is so satisfying to sing. The singers adore it because of the melody as well as the simple and progressively difficult harmony. As is the case with much of the music on this program, Shenandoah is a song of memory and longing, of connection to a place and of belonging in that place.