April 2024

This is one of my favourite songs that I’ve ever written. It’s popular with the choir I wrote it for too, The Bridge Singers. They’ve performed it several times now and is one of their favourites. This blog tells the song’s story thus far, starting in August 2019, when it was composed, right up until it’s most recent performance in January this year.

This video also tells its story and includes quotes from members of the choir and their audience, as well as excerpts of the song from various performances.

Scores

If you’d like to look at or purchase scores for the four different versions of the song that currently exist, here are the links:

Lullaby Of Silences for SSAATB choir

Lullaby Of Silences for AATTBB choir

Lullaby of Silences for SSAA choir

Lullaby of Silences for TTBB choir

To hear the whole song, try this video! You can hear further excerpts and performances further down the story.

August 2019

Taking on the task of composing something for The Bridge Singers to perform at our upcoming concerts in Felton, Keswick and Lanercost Priory, I visited Lanercost on several occasions, and while many ideas floated into my head (many of which are still there brewing) the image that I could not shake was of the statue of Elizabeth Dacre Howard amongst all the memorials and tombstones inside the old monastery. She died in 1883 at the age of four months and the statue was made by Sir Edgar Boehm.

I considered several approaches: the death of infants was a common occurrence in Victorian Britain, even amongst the wealthy; Elizabeth’s brothers and sisters went on to be soldiers, politicians, wives of these; her mother and father were influential figures too.

The nagging feeling that I could not shake off was that I wanted to write a lullaby for this and every other child who had died in infancy, and a radio interview I heard at the time told of the experience of bereaved parents listening out for the sounds of the missing child in the silences that used to be filled by that child. And so this became my focus, and thereby the title: Lullaby Of Silences.

Another point to consider for this lullaby was that it was to be a part of an autumn-themed concert, so I have gone for all four seasons passing by, and the sounds of the child being summoned by silent things that happen in each season: the opening of a daffodil; the shimmer of a rainbow; the curling of leaves; the falling of snowflakes.

I have made the video above to help The Bridge Singers learn the song, and I hope that in a couple of months’ time I will be able to replace the soundtrack with a recording of them singing it in Lanercost Priory itself.

Lullaby Of Silences - the text
 The year moves on, I see a baby in a pram.
 She rushes by, and leaves me silent.
 I hear your chuckling in the opening of the daffodil,
 And I smile at the thought of you.
  
 The sun is warm, the rain is glistening on the grass.
 The families leave me in the silence.
 I hear your snuffling in the shimmer of the rainbow,
 And I rejoice at the thought of you.
  
 Each healthy glow on a baby’s rosy cheeks
 Nips at my heart, renders me silent.
 I hear your sighing in the curling of the leaves,
 And I weep at the thought of you.
  
 Stony fingers resting gently by her side
 I touch her hand, but she is silent.
 I hear your whimpering in the falling of the snowflakes
 And I tremble at the thought of you.
  
 So I will write a lullaby
 And in the silences await your cry,
 And as I listen deeply within my memories
 In the aching hush, I’ll hum myself to sleep.  

December 2019

As I re-read this above, looking back on the first performances of Lullaby Of Silences, I’m afraid I cannot give you a full recording as sung by The Bridge Singers, but have every confidence that we will indeed manage to do that soon. I can give you lots more information though, and lots of snippets!

Almost from the very outset it was clear that this lullaby was going to be very popular with the choir. Comments to the effect that it was a favourite of all the songs I’d written for them have been common and this sort of feedback always makes me very happy and ups my confidence levels – it really is quite an extraordinary thing to pour your entire being into creating something that you consider to be worthy of a load of other people putting a lot of effort into, and then presenting it to them and trusting that they will go with you along the journey with enthusiasm.

Anyway, I wrote the tune, words, harmony and initially tried it out on my pal Penny at her house, accompanying myself on her piano. “I’m thinking basses on the first verse, or maybe one bass,” I suggested. She agreed, she gave me great encouragement with her cheery feedback. I then arranged it into SSA and tried it out on The Cheviot Singers – their director Veronica drafts me in when she goes on holiday. They loved it. I organised a summer holiday sing-along and invited people from all my choiry spheres (The Bridge Singers, Rock Festival Choir, Lionheart Harmony, The Cheviot Singers, other friends), and tried it out on them. They also loved it.

Buoyed by this, we set to with great speed and efficiency and mastered it in The Bridge Singers in time for our Autumn concerts at the end of September and beginning of October. The world premiere was in Felton at St. Michael’s Church. Here’s a snippet of that occasion.

We then took the song to Keswick and sang it at St. John’s Church to a small audience. My sister, mother and friend Fran were part of that audience, which was very special indeed for me. Here’s the next verse from that occasion!

The next day we went to Lanercost Priory and performed the lullaby twice more. The second of these was in our Autumn concert inside the glorious acoustic of the church there. My sister had the recording machine with her in the audience and here is the ending of the piece complete with audience shuffling noises, but you really do get the idea!

Prior to this concert inside the church at Lanercost we were allowed to go into the English Heritage property surrounding it and we gathered around the statue of the baby Elizabeth Dacre Howard, and we sang the song in what was an incredibly moving performance. It was hard to sing it there, and I gather hard to listen to. There were tears, as there are now as I write this. I do feel that I have written something very moving in this lullaby, but the whole piece is lifted to another level by the singing of this choir and in particular by my friend Connor, who sang the bass solo at the beginning with such sensitivity that he alone had people weeping before the rest of us had barely started. My friend Fran videoed this performance and while the tone quality does not really give justice to Connor’s gorgeous voice, I think you do get from it the rather emotional and poignant setting.

So I do not have a full recording of The Bridge Singers: at Felton they were tentative; at Keswick the setting on the machine created distortion on the loud bits; at Lanercost outdoors…well singing outdoors never makes for happy recordings and at Lanercost indoors there was a multitude of audience clicks and shufflings, but I think these four clips give you a good idea, and as I said, I think the whole thing will indeed be recorded sometime soon.

Lullaby Of Silences is the thing that I am proudest of in 2019. I set out to compose something moving and that everyone would love, that the choir could learn quickly and that we could perform at Lanercost Priory beside the statue. I feel that all of these objectives were met successfully!

Update March 2021

Towards the beginning of February, when The Bridge Singers were rehearsing via ZOOM, we voted for our all-time favourites to sing along to on Valentine’s Day. Lullaby of Silences came third in that vote, but we decided that it was too sad for such a distressing time in all our lives. However, this decision proved to be unpopular with many of the choir, so we did sing it in our Zoom Video Launch Live Concert. Connor beautifully sang the first verse of Lullaby of Silences live, before I pressed the button for the rest of the song. His Gran was sitting beside him on the sofa, and no doubt said something very complimentary to him when he finished! Here’s the clip of the opening of the song. the choir then continued to sing along to a recording of themselves performing!

If you want to learn more about that event: The Bridge Singers’ Video Launch Live “Concert” March 29th 2021 – Cheryl Camm – Composer

Update February 2022

The Bridge Singers performed Lullaby Of Silences as part of the Concert of Silences which was also live-streamed as well as having a few audience members present in the church as well. The entire livestream of the concert can be viewed here. Bear in mind that the sound is a bit odd. With everyone spread out because of COVID restrictions it was very hard to capture the entirety of the choir’s sound. However, you get the idea! Lullaby of Silences starts about 20 seconds in.

https://youtube.com/live/Eytns7pRMAk

You can read more about that concert below – we published the programme on-line so that everyone Zooming in could follow proceedings.

Concert of Silences – Cheryl Camm – Composer

Update July 2023

I was asked to provide a recording of The Bridge Singers performing this lullaby with no applause for the funeral of one of the choir’s relatives. “I have searched for untold hours to find a reading which would say something of what her passing means. Nothing I have seen fits at all. However, Lullaby of Silences is one of the most beautiful pieces I have ever sung and in truth it says everything my heavy heart needs to express.  I would be profoundly grateful if you could allow me to read it at her funeral service… In case I cannot get through this reading, would it be possible, as an alternative, to play The Bridge Singers’ recording?”

Update December 2023

We were asked to sing the song at another funeral, this time of one of our own sopranos, Margaret, who had been part of these first performances. Her husband and friends told us it was one of her favourites. The funeral was recorded by the funeral directors. We sang the song just before the service started. (There is a lot of background noise as people arrived.)

January 2024

We sang the song again in St. Michael’s Church, Felton, Northumberland as part of a concert of our current repertoire – some from Christmas, some from last summer and some from Margaret’s funeral. This church was the venue for the world premiere of this song.