By Paul Horsley

Any celebration of the Harriman-Jewell Series is to some extent a tribute to Richard Harriman, the late William Jewell College professor who cofounded the world-renowned series that bears his name. What a shame that Richard, who died in 2010, didn’t live to see this season’s 50th anniversary celebration, for among other things it features a number of artists who were longtime friends of Richard’s and who have remained loyal to the Series. One of those is The King’s Singers, the six-voice a cappella choir that is surely one of the most successful classical-music acts of our time and makes its ninth appearance on the series on December 20th. Of special note on this program is the presentation of a composition by William Jewell professor Ian Coleman titled Remembrance, which uses as its text a poem by Richard found among his papers shortly after his death.

Clark Morris, Richard’s protégé and now the Series’ director, read the poem at the August 2010 memorial service for Richard, and it was a moving experience for many. “I immediately asked Clark for a copy,” says Ian, who joined the William Jewell faculty in 2002. “I thought that at some point I might like to set it.” Remembrance was composed for the local group Octarium and received its premiere in 2012. “The words of this poem are thoughtfully reflective,” Ian adds, “and certainly leave one with the impression of the poet dealing with loss and the memories that remain.” When Ian adapted the eight-voice setting for six voices, the Grammy Award-winning King’s Singers indicated they’d like to include it on their KC program.

An expert on Shakespeare and a wide range of other literature, Professor Harriman was not known for his own poems: Nevertheless Clark found a handful of them in his papers, and says this one seems to date from Richard’s student years. “The rose is withered and the petals gone, and yet the fragrance is remembered still,” begins the poem, with a sense of loss that is mitigated by an optimism about the power of a departed one’s life-deeds. “The poem dies not, though the poet will,” it continues, making the reader immediately think of Richard and the legacy he left behind in the Series he cofounded with fellow Jewell professor Dean Dunham: more than 900 performances over a half-century, attended by untold thousands.

“The poem felt appropriate to Richard’s life work,” says Clark, “in that he wanted to do something that was meaningful.” The poem reflects “on the impact he had on the community in starting this Series, and in guiding it to where it is today,” Clark adds. “It is a warm remembrance not only of his life’s work but also of Richard himself.”

Ian recently shared some comments about Richard, and about the process of setting this poem to music. “I came to Jewell in 2002 and at that time Richard was, I think, already retired from teaching and in his last years as director of the Harriman-Jewell Series,” wrote the British-born professor, who studied at Bath and Exeter Universities and at the University of Kansas, in an email exchange. “I did not know him well, but my every interaction with him left me with the impression that he was just one of those people with whom you automatically felt at ease and that you felt you could trust. He was quiet and unassuming, yet a man of impeccable taste and always very willing to chat (even to me a new and unproven faculty member at that time). … I believe it is this combination of easy rapport and a genuine knowledge of, and love for, quality that endeared him to others.”

How difficult was it arranging an eight-voice piece for six voices? “I did approach this with some trepidation,” Ian says, “as when you have set an idea down on paper it is sometime hard to envision it in another form, even though I know composers for millennia have found themselves having to do this from time to time. It was not just the reduction from eight to six voices, but also the fact that the King’s Singers, being an all male group, have a limited upper range and I had exceeded that range by at least a third at times. In the end I did what I usually do in these sort of situations, I just sat down and started working on the problem.”

“Some of it went very easily and smoothly, other parts caused me some trouble. When I was done I ran the final arrangement by my colleague at Jewell, Dr. Anthony Maglione, the Director of Choral Studies here at Jewell. He felt what I had done would work and that gave me some assurance I was on track. We sent the piece over to the King’s Singers and they have agreed to perform it, so I assume that they are happy with it too!

“The main challenge was in watching that I kept the overall ranges comfortable, but did not lose the essence of the original piece. … Overall it was a combination of making practical ‘mechanical’ decisions about who sang what part and yet also being creative in remaining true to the intent and shape and form of the original.”

When asked about the poem’s purported “meaning,” Ian wisely skirted the question. Is there a World War I allusion, for example? Perhaps, he says, but that might only be because of our heightened awareness of that War around the commemorations of its centenary. “I can only really react to the poem from my own perspective. It seems that the poem is asking us to ponder immortality, loss, grieving, remembering, living on after a loved one has passed, and to think about how these things affect us.

“Perhaps the best way for me to say what I think the poem is ‘about’ is to say what I found in it and how that had a direct effect on the compositional decisions I made in setting it. What I think I liked about this poem is how at the outset the reader does not know it is about the loss of a loved one necessarily. It speaks of things remaining but it does not really speak specifically of personal loss, the loss at this point is all rather impersonal, like one is saying these things as generic examples, not really from personal experience. This is why I set that part with the singable melody and forward motion.

“It is the second section where one begins to feel that there is more to this that at first met the eye. The line ‘The power of memory to make a dead to dying thing revive’ begins to rouse suspicion. Which is why I set this in both a contrasting key and with a contrasting more distant, perhaps pensive, feel. This all building to the actual realization that this is, indeed, about a personal loss in the line ‘contrive to show me a forgotten face and keep a dying sorry yet alive.’

“Then, musically … I return to the opening text and music but now we hear it in full knowledge that these imagines are about real and not theoretical loss. Knowing this, there is a climax on the words “in the minds of men it will live on” knowing this, our mind, is the place the lost one may live on.

“Then, given that this is a piece in memory of Richard, the ‘poet’ in the literal sense, being the author of this poem—but also in the figurative sense of the creator and preserver of so much artistic expression—I felt I had to bring back the line ‘the poem dies not, though the poet will’ to acknowledge that reality.”

The King’s Singers, which The Times writes are “still unmatched for their sheer musicality and ability to entertain,” will perform on December 20th at the Folly Theater. Call 816-415-5025 or go to hjseries.org.

To reach Paul Horsley find him on Facebook or follow him on Twitter (@phorsleycritic), or send him email at phorsley@sbcglobal.net.

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