Description
This song cycle, for baritone and piano, sets three poems by the contemporary British poet Daniela Nunnari. (The composer has made an equally effective version for baritone and piano). As the title indicates, all three express the thoughts and feelings of people in various precarious situations.
In ‘Snakes and Ladders’ the protagonist explores the similarities between the ups and downs of a board game with life itself. ‘The Day the Clocks went Back’ is concerned with the ending of a relationship; this is reflected in the music by the fracturing of the metrical relationship between voice and piano (and the pianists’ two hands). ‘Submersed’ is an extract from a longer poem; the image of the willow is one which occurs repeatedly in the poet’s work.
Three Songs of Peril were composed and first performed in 2011.