The Dream
The Dream
Duration: 4:23
Instrumentation: Choral (SATB)
Technical Specifications: .wav 48kHz stereo audio, HD 720p video
Performer: Prairie Voices, Conductor: Geung Lee
Year: 2016
Winner of the 2017 Frances Seaton Choral Competition, The Dream is based on a poem of a similar name, A Dream, by American poet Edgar Allan Poe.
Written shortly after his wife’s death in 1847, Poe speaks of how the reality of life is at times intensely painful. He would rather dream and avoid the reality of life because of how reality has beaten and shaped him — a dream of a better world, a better reality for us all.
That holy dream—that holy dream,
While all the world were chiding,
Hath cheered me as a lovely beam
A lonely spirit guiding.
What though that light, thro' storm and night,
So trembled from afar—
What could there be more purely bright
In Truth's day-star?
In visions of the dark night
I have dreamed of joy departed—
But a waking dream of life and light
Hath left me broken-hearted.
Ah! what is not a dream by day
To him whose eyes are cast
On things around him with a ray
Turned back upon the past?
