The Emily Dickinson Project
I discovered Dickinson in my third year of school in early 2020, and immediately noticed the lyrical nature of her work. I started writing the songs before I knew her story or the context, but after reading Lyndall Gordon’s book “Lives Like Loaded Guns: Emily Dickinson and her Family’s Feuds,” I feel that what I’d written still fits the intent, but now I have much more to work with. The poems I write for are ones I’m already quite fond of, but my appreciation has increased by sitting and spending more time with each one of them. I’m able to analyze the micro themes happening, the rhymes and half rhymes, the added syllable which forces an extended phrase length, the context in which the poem was written, the original versus Mabel’s edits, the punctuation between the two copies; it’s a fun and rewarding process musically and historically. Writing these songs has grown my arranging techniques as well as my performance skills – I feel as though a gate has been unlocked.
Personnel
Emmett Martin Hatlelid | Vox
Brad Shigeta | Trombone
Miles Black | Piano
Noah Gotfrit | Bass
I am grateful to have three, very skilled, and talented musicians accompanying me on this project.
Brad Shigeta is a master Trombonist in Vancouver, BC, who studied with Jimmy Knepper, Count Basie Orchestra trombonist Benny Powell. He played for the Clifford Jordan Big Band, the Illinois Jacquet Big Band, the Dave Holland Big Band, the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, Vince Giordano and the Nighthawks and the Duke Ellington Orchestra under the direction of Mercer Ellington.
Based in Vancouver, BC, Miles Black is a highly respected career musician bringing an enormous wealth of musical experience and expertise to most every facet of the music industry. Firstly known as one of Canada’s most accomplished jazz pianists, Miles is also highly acclaimed and sought after as an arranger, producer, composer, session musician, guitarist, vocalist, bassist, saxophonist, songwriter, and musical theatre director.
Noah Gotfrit is a double bassist/composer born and raised on the unceded lands of the Xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and Səl̓ilwətaɁɬ nations. He spent several years working as a musician in New Orleans and has toured extensively across Europe, Western Canada and the United States with a wide variety of musical acts. He is committed to respecting and honoring the Black American musical tradition known as Jazz and to finding his own voice both as a bassist and a composer. His big sound and solid feel led him to play with some of Western Canada’s finest players such as Oliver Gannon, PJ Perry, Brad Shigeta and others. Noah is a former performance and composition student at the Vancouver Community College School of Music where he studied with bassists Paul Rushka and Laurence Mollerup.
Examples Of The Project
Currently, there are no professionally made recordings. So for now, enjoy these four demos below, recorded in my living room on December 4th, 2022.
Come Slowly, Eden!
This is my most recent addition to the collection of songs. I tried to emphasize the slow and unrushed long vowels by having the melody always resolve after the chords, intentionally landing on a harsh dissonance, and then resolving naturally into a chord tone. This was also to give the listener the feeling of “counting their nectars” before reaching ecstasy or “Eden.”
Come slowly – Eden!
Lips unused to Thee –
Bashful – sip thy Jessamines –
As the fainting Bee –
Reaching late his flower,
Round her chamber hums –
Counts his nectars –
Enters – and is lost in Balms.
The Sea Of Sunset
This work is using the Mabel Loomis Todd rendition. Todd was an actor, singer, and pianist, as well as an editor. A woman who was truly a force to be reckoned with, even in a world completely dominated by men. She recognized the lyrical properties of Dickinson’s work, and pushed hard for them to be published, finally convincing a publisher by reading one aloud, using her lyrical delivery to reveal just how astonishing these poems were. For the general audience Todd made heavy edits to the poems, and so although her work was required to bring them into light, they didn’t come without their own faults. For this song I wrote it before I knew any of this drama, and so kept her original lyric, as for the sake of a song (as it does work better rhythmically) and to honor her in a way for the work she’s done.
THIS is the land the sunset washes,
These are the banks of the Yellow Sea;
Where it rose, or whither it rushes,
These are the western mystery!
Night after night her purple traffic
Strews the landing with opal bales;
Merchantmen poise upon horizons,
Dip, and vanish with fairy sails.
I Hide Myself Within My Flower
I went to Butchart Gardens in the summer of 2021. It was interesting to see such a pristine but clearly very controlled garden. It was beautiful, but a bit eerie. It made this poem sprout into my mind with a melody in mind for it, and upon returning home I set it to paper.
I hide myself within my flower,
That wearing on your breast,
You, unsuspecting, wear me too—
And angels know the rest.
I hide myself within my flower,
That, fading from your vase,
You, unsuspecting, feel for me
Almost a loneliness.
To Fight Aloud Is Very Brave
Given her time living in puritan New England as a woman in combination with her suffering from epilepsy, she was unable to live a normal life, as epileptic attacks were seen to have been caused by sinful living and thoughts. Her condition was a very hidden fact at the time, and is only known now through her medical prescriptions. Although there were problems in her family, it seems that she was well loved by all of her kin, which supported her fully through this, up into her early passing at the age of 56. We all have demons to battle. Many of Dickinson’s poems have assisted and are assisting me in this battle. This one in particular–as with most of the poems I set music to–has been lodged in my head for some time, and so on Remembrance Day of 2020 I sat down to setting it.
To fight aloud, is very brave –
But gallanter, I know
Who charge within the bosom
The Calvalry of Wo –
Who win, and nations do not see –
Who fall – and none observe –
Whose dying eyes, no Country
Regards with patriot love –
We trust, in plumed procession
For such, the Angels go –
Rank after Rank, with even feet –
And Uniforms of snow.