Thimble 00:22
White Spaces 04:25
Acoustic 06:11
Music direction: Sir George Benjamin
Soprano: Elspeth Piggott
Clarinet: Andrew Sparling
Piano: Dominic Saunders
Group photo: Mark Smedley
Photo of Jill Bamber: Mireya Liddle
Video: Ian Phillips-Kerr
Sound recording and Production: Adaq Khan
Poems: Jill Bamber
Copyright © 2024 David Aprahamian Liddle
Thimble
In ‘Thimble’ each vocal phrase occurs three times, mirroring the terza rima structure of the poem. The gentle lilt of the piano part suggests the gliding motion of a boat, while the final sinking right hand phrase echoes the thimble’s descent through the water.
Thimble
Where willow roots engaging the subliminal
finger darkness, combing through the rain
to join at last the hidden animal
that is the river's iridescent skin
my mother's thimble left my middle finger
to settle in the water's cloudy vein
while I sewed on your button, oh my lover
- though no one on a boat should ever sew –
and you could feel the pulsing of the rudder
urgent in your hands against the flow,
laden May trees arching over blue
standing in the glitter of their snow
and all the while I tried to gather you,
the angle of your jaw, your stretching hand
drawn on the page as if the tilt I knew
might teach me how to find in shifting sand
minute diversions in the river's engine,
a trace you might have left, the faintest legend
perhaps the thimble in the river's twine
that, lying unconfessed, I can't release
how in your service I let go the line
that linked me to my mother's lonely peace
so that its loss became a votive offering
deep as a dream and gone without a trace.
I could have said I saw the mallard rising
treading water, heavy in the air
and that was why the thimble started twisting
yet I am thankful that it's lying there
as secret as the body of a lover
as devious as daughter to her mother.
Copyright © 2002 Jill Bamber
White Spaces
In ‘White Spaces’ the piano chords of daytime show the blossom stabbing the hedge with light. These high chords are later replaced by low chords at night time. The poet compares twigs and spaces of the blackthorn with written words, providing a mystical link with nature, as we glimpse the April moon. This song employs a distinct mode to convey a magical atmosphere.
White Spaces
Blackthorn blossom
stabs the hedge with light.
No leaves diffuse
this suddenness.
I see the sky behind
its stubborn mesh
like the white spaces
round the words I write
where meaning gathers
flooding into silences.
At night the bare
vernacular of twigs
is searched again.
An April moon
is widening the darkness.
Copyright © 1993 Jill Bamber.
Acoustic
‘Acoustic’ muses on the effect that the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral has on sound. The triolet structure of this short poem incorporates repeated lines, and the mood is whimsical.
Acoustic
I never knew a dome could cause delay
bending music round the ringing stone
nose to tail like circling dogs at play.
You’d never dream a dome could cause delay.
Learn to wait, it hasn’t gone away
music trickling slowly down to bone.
I never knew a dome could cause delay
bending music round the ringing stone.
Copyright © 2004 Jill Bamber
