Weir's Swimmer

[sawyl]

I love Judith Weir's song cycle Natural History very much indeed. The texts, drawn from the inner chapters o the Chuang Tzu, are perfectly matched by Weir's clarity and elegance of Weir's music.

Here, then, is Swimmer, with its great swelling opening reminiscent of a rough sea and a man struggling against the currents:

The words tell of Confucius' encounter with a man who he believes is drowning:

There was a rock where water fell, and foamed for forty miles; it was a place where fish and turtles could not swim, but in the waves, Confucius saw a man. He took him for someone in trouble who wanted to die; but the swimmer rose out of the water and climbed on the bank with a song on his lips: "I was born in dry land, I grew up in the waves, I go out with the flow, I follow the Way of the water. That is how I stay afloat."

It's a familiar sentiment, beautifully expressed.