Gerald Finzi - Intimations of Immortality - Op. 29. James Gilchrist, tenor.

"The clouds that gather round the setting sun
Do take a sober colouring from an eye
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality;
Another race hath been, and other palms are won.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live,
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears."
(Closing stanza from William Wordsworth's "Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood": 1804)
This is one of the best-known works by English composer Gerald Finzi. It is a setting of nine of the eleven stanzas (all but the seventh and eighth) of William Wordsworth's "Ode: Intimations of Immortality", cast as a single continuous movement of around 40 minutes duration.
Finzi began composing the work in the late 1930s, but did not complete it until 1950.
Images
I took these images last week (June 2018) in various places in the Peak District (Derbyshire and Staffordshire parts) England. The church and its wonderful gothic lancet-canopied sedilia is St. Leonard's at Thorpe, Derbyshire - the squat Normal tower being its greatest treasure, dated c.1100. The aerial shot of Arbor Low at 12:45 - a Neolithic Henge Monument, also in Derbyshire, is here by courtesy of Webb Aviation.
Performers
James Gilchrist, Tenor
Bournemouth Symphony Chorus and Orchestra
David Hill, Conductor
Rec. The Concert Hall, The Lighthouse, Poole, 4-5 June 2005
A Naxos Recording: 8.557863