Remembering Our Fathers

For orchestra and three female voices

The Role (soprano)

Mary Todd Lincoln, Lincoln’s wife and First Lady of the United States, was rather temperamental and was deeply disturbed over the deaths of her children and husband---which is understandable! Willie, their son who is unnamed in this text, died at age 11.

The Text

The text has been extrapolated from actual quotes made by or about Lincoln. No editorial summaries were made. The words come from famous contemporaries or from letters from and speeches by Lincoln. Minor changes were made on occasion to execute rhymes where appropriate. The poetic scheme matches the poetic scheme that would have been in use in the mid-19th century.

The Music

The music relects the fact that Mary Todd Lincoln was very emotionally disturbed. Incorporated into the accompanying orchestration (though pretty well disguised) are the famous slavery song 'Wade in the Water' and the Civil War fiddle song 'Billy in the Low Ground.'

ABRAHAM LINCOLN - as through Mary Todd Lincoln:

There is a world above where sorrow is unknown.
A long eternity of love, formed for the good alone.
And faith beholds the dying here,
Translated to that glorious sphere.
O son! Our son!
Your untimely death,
no comforting can suffice,
since you exhaled your last breath!

The 'House' is enchanting, yet the charm is dispelled.
Ev'rything appears a mockery, where once you dwelled.
You and your father were intimates, often seen hand in hand.
And now his heavy heart joins the struggle of this Land.
So brave! So kind!
A creative mind so active;
you were just like your father,
save that you were attractive!

Your father, a nation's father, the Father of Emancipation.
Still shaken soon after your death, he issued his great Proclamation:
"That all persons held as slaves henceforward shall be free."
It was the first of the year of eighteen sixty three.
On a battlefield of war,
in that very same year:
One of Abe's greatest speeches,
how he wished you'd been there!

"Four score and seven years" began his famous address.
Though he felt the bravery of the men surpassed what words could not express.
"We here highly resolve that these dead have not died in vain.
We dedicate this field for these brave men living and slain.
And that this nation
shall have a new birth.
a government of the by the for the people
shall not perish from the earth!”

Since my eighteenth year when without delay,
he said: "Miss Todd I want to dance the worst way"
he has been "husband, brother, father, all,
all to me, truly my all"
And the love you shared
when just eleven may
you now enjoy
in Heaven.

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