Description
This setting attempts to capture the many moods of the text by Mechtild of Magdeburg (translated by Jane Hirschfield): frustration, wistfulness, urgency, and ecstasy. A disjunct opening fanfare intermingled with solos develops into a more lyric section with stumbling rhythms in the accompaniment. A restatement of the opening text, “I cannot dance, O Lord, unless you lead me,” is pressing and rhythmic followed by a flowing and melodic realization of “whirling into love.”
