Setting of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s text for SATB voices. Original treble choir version commissioned and premiered by the Red Rose Children’s Choir, Chicago, IL, Sharon Augsburger and Jacquelyn Negus, Founders and Artistic Directors.

Also available for SATB.

TEXT:
Let me go where’er I will
I hear a skyborn music still:
It sounds from all things old,
It sounds from all things young,
From all that’s fair, from all that’s foul,
Alway, alway something sings.

It is not only in the rose,
It is not only in the bird,
Not only where the rainbow glows,
Nor in the song of woman heard,
But in the darkest, meanest things
There alway, alway something sings.

‘Tis not in the high stars alone,
Nor in the cup of budding flowers,
Nor in the red-breast’s mellow tone,
Nor in the bow that smiles in showers.
But in the darkest, meanest things
There alway, alway something sings.