Love You Big as the Sky

“I love you.”

“How much do you love me, Daddy?”

“I love you big as the sky.”

It’s a memory from my wife’s childhood. The moment she told me, I just knew I had to use these words – they seemed to evoke so much. ‘Love You Big as the Sky’, written for 40-part choir, is a love song set in and around the island of Lindisfarne. It moves from clouds and stars to sea and land, setting the poem ‘Lindisfarne’ by poet Jean Florence.

Other text sources include cloud names, children’s lullabies, haiku, diary fragments, Valentine cards, the Farne isles, shipwrecks, lighthouses and the 16th century poem ‘Western Wynde.’

Each section is echoed by a remnant from a traditional vocal form (mass, chorale, opera, song-cycle, cantata etc).

The climax of the piece features a 6-bar oratorio on words from the Song of Songs, ‘Love is as strong as death’. Everything ends with the words:

‘We shall return as birds to this island,
Our love as big as the sky.
Love you big as the sky.’

Peter McGarr, composer

1. Cloud Motet

O coruscans lux stellarum,
O splendissima specialis forma regalium nuptiarum,
O fulgens gemma;
tu es ornata in alta persona, quae non habet masculatam rugam.

(O glittering starlight, O most splendid and precious form of regal marriage, O shining jewel: you are adorned like a noble lady who is without blemish)

Cirrostratus Cirrocumulus Altostratus Altocumulus

Cumulus Cumulonimbus Stratocumulus Nimbostratus

2. Westron Wynde Mass

Westron wynde when wilt thou blow
the small rayne down can rayne
Cryst yf my love were in my armys
and I yn my bed agayne.

Gloria: Et in terra pax
Credo: Patrem omnipotentem
Sanctus: Sanctus
Agnus Dei: Dona nobis pacem

3. Chorale No. 1

Silently, one by one, in the infinite meadows of heaven
Blossomed the lovely stars.

(Longfellow)

4. Lullabies and Constellations

Come to the window my baby with me,
And look at the stars that shine on the sea.
There are two stars that play hide and seek,
Who see a dear baby that should be asleep.

(Anon)

Darkness falls on September skies,
Summer triangle of stars remain.
Arcturus fades below the north-west horizon.
Stardust trail leads east:
Denab, Altair, Vega and Perseus.
Cappella twinkles brightly in the north.
Pegasus high to the south east.

(Astronomy handbook)

5. Song-Cycle: Nine Dawn Watercolours

1.Late moon Clouding hills In a distance of indigo 2.Restless sea Unknown faces From a sepia photograph 3.Sunrise of songs The birds imagined 4.New islands rise Dawn shadows fade

5. A point of land Catching clouds In echoes 6. Just can't sleep Hearing that old Familiar love song 7.Morning waves Lighting your sleeping face 8. All the dreams remain To haunt the day 9. Now the fragrant night vanishes

(Acton Saywell)

O now the drenched land wakes ...

(Kenneth Patchen, text not included for copyright reasons)

6. Cantata Farne Aurora

7. Recitative:
On seeing Lindisfarne from a great distance

8. Lindisfarne Passion

Set out on a bright morning
travelling north, back to beginnings.
Morpeth, Alnmouth, Craster,
Seahouses where we used to book a boat trip
with Billy Shiels out
to the islands to welcome home
the puffins, land
on Inner Fame where Cuthbert
lived alone with sea birds
and with otters.

Bamburgh, Budle Bay, where
godwit and dunlin search the mudflats
following the tide, and now
I see it.
Like a dark brushstroke
far out on the horizon.

Further on and up,
the sky wide above me and the sea beside me,
to the small lane turning, down
across the level crossing
to the causeway. Tide’s out
and two mute swans sail serene,
on the channel.
Plover and sanderling at the water’s edge
and an elegance of oystercatchers.

Along the dunes and through the village.
Park at last on grass
below the castle
above the harbour.

Getting out the wind engulfs me,
takes my breath and leaves me standing
gasping, beaming, April in high summer.
Across the bright blue running water
spotlights flash, illuminating
now Bamburgh Castle to the south, now Berwick
on the far northern edge of vision,
while storm clouds pour from off the top of Cheviot.

(from ‘Lindisfarne’ by Jean Florence)

The Farne Islands

Holy Island of Lindisfarne

Diary fragments

As the tide ebbs and flows, this place is surrounded twice daily by the waves of the sea
like an island.

(The Venerable Bede)

9. Chorale No. 2

All my love I give you.

10. Aria – Te Deum

How can words show the love I feel for you.
How can words touch my heart like you do.
You are the soul of my world,
The sound of my life.
All the music ever written was written for you.
All the love ever loved was loved for you.
I will love you beyond skies,
Love you beyond stars.
I will love you now and forever,
My love for you is endless.

(From a Valentine card)

Te Deum laudamus

11. Anthem of Psalms

12. Ballad

Kiss me with the kisses of your mouth,
For your love is more delightful than wine.
Pleasing is the fragrance of your perfume,
Your name is like perfume poured out.
I am my lover’s and my lover is mine
Until day breaks and shadows flee.
Love is as strong as death.
It burns like a mighty flame.
Many waters cannot quench love,
Rivers cannot wash it away.

(Song of Songs)

13. Haiku Requiem

I remember the things I ought to:
sky and sea anemonies,
spade and bucket enamelled blue
with yellow flowers.
The shore at low tide.
I remember still evenings;
reaching the railway bridge,
past a luxury of hedgerow and vetch.
The silver thread of line stretching
from horizon to horizon –
straining my ears, catching the imaginary distance.
Signals changing in a green ripple,
reflecting off the tracks, making the road glow.
The shout from the train as it rushed under our feet.
We were kings of the Earth.
Walking home, Farne lighthouses shining
and in that rare atmosphere the beam would sweep
across miles of mainland field,
Then back across the wrinkled sea.
I know at those times I was truly happy.
How time changes everything.

(Peter McGarr – after James Jarvis: “Northumbrian Recollections”)

14. Love songs over Farne

15. Oratorio: Love is as strong as death

16. Keening

17. Lachrimae (Stabat Mater dolorosa)

18. Ghost Aria

19. Chorale No.3

Do not stand at my grave and weep;
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.

I am the sunlight on ripened grain
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning’s hush
I am the swift uplifting rush

Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there, I did not die.

(Mary Fry)

Epitaph for Thomas Tallis (from his grave at Greenwich)

He maryed was, though children he had none,
and lived in Love full three and thirty Yere,
With loyal spowse, whose name yclipt was Jone.

Westron Wynde Mass (reprise)

Cryst yf my love
were in my armys
and I yn my bed agayne.

Stabat Mater dolorosa

Dona nobis pacem

20. Love You Big as the Sky

We shall return as birds to this island,
Our love as big as the sky.
Love You Big as the Sky.