Here is a recording of my composition “The Gift to Sing,” which was commissioned by William and Carolyn Kobler in honor of their 50th class reunion at Luther College. (This is just a bootleg recording I made with my phone. I hope that a better ‘official’ recording will be shared with me at some point.)
This beautiful text is by James Weldon Johnson, who is probably best-known today for penning the lyrics to the hymn “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” (He was the first African-American to lead the NAACP.)
“Sometimes the mist overhangs my head and blackening clouds about me cling.
But oh, I have a magic spell to turn the gloom to cheerful day.
I softly sing.
And if the way grows darkening, shadowed by sorrow’s somber wing,
With glad defiance in my throat, I pierce the darkness with a note
and sing and sing.
I brood not over the broken past nor dread whatever time shall bring.
No nights are dark, no days are long, while in my heart there swells a song
and I can sing.”