The Mountain and Tidewater Songs

The Mountain and Tidewater Songs are a set of six pieces for baritone, cello, piano, and violin. The songs are drawn from a series of poems by Daniel Mark Epstein, which appear in "No Vacancies in Hell". A deep sense of place, as well as the sweep, lyricism, and warmth of nineteenth-century American life inform both the poetry and music. The cycle charts the journey and reflections of an exile as he leaves behind the towns, countryside, and people he has known. These places and...
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The Mountain and Tidewater Songs are a set of six pieces for baritone, cello, piano, and violin. The songs are drawn from a series of poems by Daniel Mark Epstein, which appear in "No Vacancies in Hell". A deep sense of place, as well as the sweep, lyricism, and warmth of nineteenth-century American life inform both the poetry and music. The cycle charts the journey and reflections of an exile as he leaves behind the towns, countryside, and people he has known. These places and characters, like the apparitions of memory, become an interior landscape, where romance, adventure, duels, buffoonery, loss, villainy, and kindness all play out in ever-swirling reverie and drama.

The violin and cello parts are included.

Praise for Damon Ferrante's music:

Tim Smith of "The Baltimore Sun" calls Ferrante's music "focused and colorful...with an unexpected, decidedly poetic touch."

"If the tune has the elegance of traditional opera, the harmonization is very modern as the vocal lines climb and descend the melodic staircases that Ferrante has constructed for them."

Geoffrey Himes, "The Baltimore City Paper"

Mary MacCauley of "The Baltimore Sun" describes Ferrante's music as "ebullient and full of shifts of direction."

See a video for "The Mountain & Tidewater Songs" on Damon Ferrante's author page at Amazon (just click on his name here for the link).