• Date: 1921
• Main Performer: Charles Ives
• Genre: Vocal
• Period: Modern (1870-)

Review

This song was dated 1921 in Ives' 114 Songs publication of that year, but may have been written earlier. An eerie, Gothic text by Lord Byron is set to an obsessively repeated pattern of four notes in the vocal part that is varied only slightly in pitch and rhythm, like a demented waltz. The piano plays constant harp-like arpeggiations of a complex harmony that mysteriously supports the vocal line: "When the moon is on the wane, and the glowworm in the grass, and the meteor on the grave, and the wisp on the morass ... when the falling stars are shocking ... and the silent leaves are still in the shadow of the hill ..." The voice suddenly breaks out of its pattern to declare: "Shall my soul be upon thine with a power and with a sigh." The murky mood is intensified by the composer's instruction to use the pedals "almost constantly." A spine-chilling oath of spiritual possession. ~ All Music Guide

Albums with Complete Performances of the Work

Title	Date
Ives: Songs, Vol.2	1991
Ives: When The Moon, Songs Set for Orchestra	2000
Charles Ives: Melodies
The Complete Songs of Charles Ives, Vol. IV	1994