Love Song

Love Song for Viola d’Amore and Harp is inspired by the warm resonance of the viola d’amore’s 7 bowed and 7 sympathetically vibrating strings (tuned here to A-D-A-D-F#-A-D), and the open sonorities of the harp. The viola presents a germinal theme in its low register, outlining the A-D-F# harmony over a low A drone while moving through neighbor notes E-flat and G and returning to the open double-stop A-D. The harp’s murmuring bisbigliando surrounds the viola’s sustained bows, and its punctuating arpeggios and glissandi offer supportive contrast. The music develops organically, with viola and harp intertwining and climaxing in their upper registers. They bask in the intimacy of quiet harmonics, before returning home to the sustained low register of the beginning, now colored by their shared musical journey.

Meira Warshauer, 2024

The recording below is from Rachel Talitman, harp, and Pierre-Henri Xuereb, viola d’amore, for their release Viola and Harp Recital: Women Composers