My Lady White by David Maslanka (Audio)

Performed by Jacob Wrobel in White Hall of the James C. Olsen Performing Arts Center at the University of Missouri-Kansas City on August 29th, 2020
I. madrigals - my lady white: 0:00-3:59
II. spring...birds sing...a gift of rings: 3:59-6:40
III. for pretty Allison: 6:41-9:26
"The title, My Lady White, is a reference to a poem by Geoffrey Chaucer; an elegy for a woman named Blanche who was his devoted courtly love who he described as “supremely modest, yet easily approachable, refined, temperate, lighthearted and pious without sternness or coldness.” I call the three movements of My Lady White madrigals because the remind me of those brief, intimate, emotional song forms. The words, A Gift of Rings, from the title of the second piece are the title of a poem by the modern English poet Robert Graves. Graves also spent his life searching for the ‘White Goddess’, which is the name of a book that he wrote. For Pretty Alison: Alison is my wife, my best friend, and in many ways my own ‘Lady White’."
-David Maslanka