Movement 2 from "Bedtime Stories (beyond the window)" for soprano, flute, oboe, cello, and piano. Composed by P. Brent Register. Text by Pamela Chillemi-Yeager. Sari Gruber (soprano), Cathy Herrera (flute), P. Brent Register (oboe), Jonathan Dexter (cello), James Lesniak (piano), Casey Teske (conductor). Cover image: Nathan Buzzanca

Thumbelina (text)

Maternal longing
spun with magic
Tiniest cherub, empty arms filled

Petal-wrapped slumber
Sun-drenched days
Cherished child, see how she grows
No bigger than a thumb

Seeing the world on butterfly wings
Singing with sparrows
Sailing the rivers on glossy green leaves
Sunlight dancing like diamonds on the water

Adventures unfolding
Laughter and tears
Danger and longing

Captured. Freed.
Her own heart's love
Hearts beating in tender rhythm

Tumbling
   Tumbling 
        Thumbelina down

2. Thumbelina

Movement 6 from "Bedtime Stories (beyond the window)" for soprano, flute, oboe, cello, and piano. Composed by P. Brent Register. Text by Pamela Chillemi-Yeager. Sari Gruber (soprano), Cathy Herrera (flute), P. Brent Register (oboe), Jonathan Dexter (cello), James Lesniak (piano), Casey Teske (conductor).

Little Suck-a-Thumb (text)

A mother's love has many faces
Like a rainbow or a peacock's feathers
Textures and tastes, sweet and bitter
Teaching. Guiding. Loving care.

Medea and Medusa, Messalina, too
All tenderness obscured
Insistence like a thunderstorm
Dark colors in full bloom

'Do not suck your thumb,' one mother said  
to her most stubborn son
Yet suck he did, most heartily
From sunrise to sundown

Frustration  led to primal means
More loving ways discarded
Threats with desperation came 
And this is what she told him:

'A tailor with the sharpest shears
Will come and cut them off
If you persist in doing this
I urge you, son,  to stop!'

Insistence in a child's breast
As strong as any mother's
Can't quell the urge to suck his thumbs
Nor ands or buts or 'druthers

And so Medea reared her head, along with Messalina
Medusa writhed her tentacles
And whispered most obscenely:
'You tried and tried, now let us help
No other course is seemly.'

Just a dream, the mother thought
No creature does exist
To slash the thumbs off little tots
What brutal nonsense, this

Then to her horror she did hear 
a hideous scream most dreadful
And  ran to find her bloody child
The stumps of his thumbs  severed 

The moral in this gruesome tale
The price for disobeying
Does kindle terror in the hearts 
of children through the ages

Shake your heads and roll your eyes
At wicked ways of dealing 
Yet seek the tailor with sharp shears
Ignore him to your peril

6. Little Suck-a-Thumb

Movement 5 from "Bedtime Stories (beyond the window)" for soprano, flute, oboe, cello, and piano. Composed by P. Brent Register. Text by Pamela Chillemi-Yeager. Sari Gruber (soprano), Cathy Herrera (flute), P. Brent Register (oboe), Jonathan Dexter (cello), James Lesniak (piano), Casey Teske (conductor).

The Well Speaks (Frau Holle) (text)

Ancient stones covered with lichen
cool sweet water fills my walls

A spherical womb
Slick with blood and tears
Prayers and reflections
Seasons my cooling broth

Loamy soil, rich good earth
A wondrous portal 
Gleaming magic in sun-drenched meadows
Golden delicious, juicy nectar with  warm, fresh bread

Goodness rewarded
Virtue acclaimed
Sloth rebuked
Grief washed away in my venerable fortress

5. The Well Speaks (Frau Holle)

Movement 1 from "Bedtime Stories (beyond the window)" for soprano, flute, oboe, cello, and piano. Composed by P. Brent Register. Text by Pamela Chillemi-Yeager. Sari Gruber (soprano), Cathy Herrera (flute), P. Brent Register (oboe), Jonathan Dexter (cello), James Lesniak (piano), Casey Teske (conductor).

The Pea Speaks (The Princess and the Pea)
Splendid grandeur!
Expectations!

Beneath the moon, so lush and full
A fevered yearning lay.
A prince alone, a palace grand
Seeking his heart's mate.

A princess bride to rule with him,
welcome arms at battles end.
Tender heart and face so sweet,
a bride, a mate and friend.

Only royalty holds its luster 
beneath a  shimmering façade

Magical castings upon my shell
Mounds of feathers, comforting down
Satin coverlet 

Ripples of wonder shivering up
A princess knows insomnia
Discomfort champions the future queen.

Sifting through feathers of snow-soft white
pristine wonders, no rest tonight

So haggard she is in the morn
Embarrassed by her state
And thus confused, the King and Queen
Declare her joyful fate.

Splendid grandeur!
Expectations!

Escaped to glimmer in the bride's crown

1. The Pea Speaks (The Princess and the Pea)

Movement 3 from "Bedtime Stories (beyond the window)" for soprano, flute, oboe, cello, and piano. Composed by P. Brent Register. Text by Pamela Chillemi-Yeager. Sari Gruber (soprano), Cathy Herrera (flute), P. Brent Register (oboe), Jonathan Dexter (cello), James Lesniak (piano), Casey Teske (conductor).

The Spider and the Fly

Please come into my parlor, said the spider to the fly
Pretty teasing words tumbling from the sky

A sweet, seductive shower, like manna from above
Ringing with such welcome, dare I think it love?

Could love at long last light my grey-grim little world?
Such soft, insistent  words within my soul they twirled

A  promise oh-so-tender in his relentless invitation
An embryonic whirl of burgeoning  consternation

Summoning resistance,  buzzing far away
Past the monarch butterflies as they glide my way

Their aching velvet splendor, lost in my world so old
No shroud of black,  those rainbows, with their dazzling blues and gold
 
Why not, I rail, as anger blooms, why can it not be me?
He said I'm pretty, after all, why can it not just be?

And so at last in high delusion
I sweep  aside my deep confusion

His oily web, a gossamer prison
Trapping me with swift derision

Would that I escaped this plot
Ignoring  flattery filled with rot

So run from words my little dears, with falsities so hollow
An oft-told tale that bears repeating, lest you drown in sorrow.

3. The Spider and the Fly

Movement 4 from "Bedtime Stories (beyond the window)" for soprano, flute, oboe, cello, and piano. Composed by P. Brent Register. Text by Pamela Chillemi-Yeager. Sari Gruber (soprano), Cathy Herrera (flute), P. Brent Register (oboe), Jonathan Dexter (cello), James Lesniak (piano), Casey Teske (conductor).

Rumpy (Rumpelstiltskin)

Forest deep
Castles grand
Kings and cottages
Avarice

Straw to gold the story told
An impish fiend and a trembling maiden
Spinning riches, spinning glory

Twinkling jewels
Offerings and vows, promises forgotten

Debts come calling
A  mother's love
Swift and savage grace
Entreaties made

The imp himself singing a tune
Revealing his name beneath the moon

A trinity  of days, bargains struck
A name revealed
A debt erased

P. Brent Register

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