Footfalls

Sept 2025. TTBB and Piano / 2:50

A wistful, tender, and intensely romantic ballad crafted beautifully for the nuanced colors of low voices. This piece leans into the expressive, velvety ranges of a TTBB ensemble to paint a picture of longing, memory, and a lover awaiting a wandering companion with a warm theme opening to a grand melody in this original setting of the Henry Kendall (1839-1882) poem. It offers conductors an ideal vehicle for teaching fluid legato phrasing and deep emotional vulnerability.

From Footfalls by Henry Kendall

The embers were blinking and clinking away,

The casement half open was thrown;

There was nothing but cloud on the skirts of the Day,

And I sat on the threshold alone!

And said to the river which flowed by my door

With its beautiful face to the hill,

"I have waited and waited, all wearied and sore,

But my love is a wanderer still!"