One of my commissions in 2024 has been to write this song, Knit Me Together, in memory of my friend and choir colleague Carol Evans who died in May this year. She was a member of the alto section of The Bridge Singers and her husband Richard is a bass in the choir. We performed at her “Service of Thanksgiving and Life Celebration” in June. We sang a selection beforehand and three songs during the event: Days by Ray Davies; Right, Said Fred by Ted Dicks and Myles Rudge; O Radiant Dawn by James McMillan.

You can hear the entirety of Carol’s Celebration here: Carol’s Memorial Service on Vimeo

We’ve been singing “Days” and “O Radiant Dawn” for a couple of years and they are two of our favourites. “Right, Said Fred” was a new one for us to sing. There is no commercial arrangement of it for choir, but it was one of Carol’s favourite songs, so I set to., and the choir did the learning of it in record time. It entered our repertoire for the remainder of the year and we performed it a few times.

At the service extracts from Psalm 139 were read out, and during several memories of Carol which were shared by several people from different areas of her life, there were many references to her knitting and other crafty work.

After the service, Richard asked me to set parts of Psalm 139 to music for the choir to sing one day. I agreed, and promised that when I’d finished, we have a look at it and perhaps sing it later in the year or in 2025. The lyrics he gave me were:

You created my inmost self,
knit me together in my mother's womb.
For so many marvels I thank you;
a wonder am I, and all your works are wonders.
You knew me through and through,
my being held no secrets from you,
when I was being formed in secret,
textured in the depth of the earth. 
Your eyes could see my embryo.

I finished the song in the autumn, and the choir had a go, and will learn it in 2025. They seemed to like it.

Much of the music of “Knit Me Together” consists of interweaving and repeating patterns, (knitted together, I guess!) underneath which the main, flowing melody wends it way. There is a contrasting middle section where a different flowing melody is heard in the soprano part and the lower voices provide pointed rhythms in accompaniment. The song ends with a series of repeats of this “knit me together” phrase, increasingly quietly.

Four of us sang the world premiere at the choir’s “Carols and Wintry Songs” concert on December 7th along with tributes to two other members of the choir who died in the last year. You can read more about that concert here: Carols and Wintry Songs

Storm Darragh was raging outside during the concert, but nevertheless, we recorded it, Richard and Carol’s daughter Abi videoed it from her seat in the audience, and here you have a record of the world premiere:

Because of the storm noise and because we stuffed up a couple of seconds of it, Rebekah, Jamie, Connor and I met up again a week later in the same church to record it again, and here’s that version, which the four of us think is much, much better:

What I hope, is that next year when the choir learns it, there will be a third performance to share with you.

Update. May 2025 The choir did learn the song and we performed it at our Songs For May Day concerts. The middle section was still solos as we all, including Richard rather liked that contrast!