Twelve Poems of Emily Dickinson is a song cycle for medium voice and piano by the American composer Aaron Copland.
Completed in 1950 and lasting for just under half an hour, it represents Copland's longest work for solo voice.[1] He assigned the first line of each poem as the song title, Emily Dickinson having not titled any of the pieces. The exception is "The Chariot", which was Dickinson's original published title.
Each song is dedicated to a composer friend. The sequence, with dedicatees, is:
Copland himself acknowledged that many have heard the influence of Charles Ives, Gustav Mahler, and Gabriel Fauré in the songs. In his own memoirs, he made the link between Dickinson's and Mahler's preoccupation with death, however he stated that he recognized no direct musical influence.[2] Nonetheless, writers have frequently cited the fifth song in particular, "Heart, We Will Forget Him!" as being Copland at his most Mahlerian.[3] This is perhaps even more evident the orchestral setting, which he began in 1958. Completed in 1970, Eight Poems of Emily Dickinson for small orchestra omits 3, 8, 9 and 10 from the original sequence.[4]
The original version was premiered at Columbia University on 18 May 1950, with soloist Alice Howland accompanied by the composer.[5] It was not especially well-received by critics, prompting Copland to note wryly to Leonard Bernstein, "that I decided I must have written a better cycle than I had realized."[6] The first recording was made by Copland and Martha Lipton for Columbia Masterworks Records in 1956. The premiere of the orchestration was given on 14 November 1970 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, with soloist Gwendolyn Killebrew and the Juilliard Orchestra conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas.[6] The orchestral arrangement was first recorded by Marni Nixon and the Pacific Symphony Orchestra under Keith Clark for Varese Sarabande in 1985. Tilson Thomas subsequently recorded the cycle for EMI with Barbara Hendricks and the London Symphony Orchestra in 1995.
Both versions have been recorded many times since their respective premieres.