Batter’s Box for Soprano and Piano
Duration: 18’
Text by Kenny Berkowitz and Bridget Meeds
Performers: American Modern Ensemble: Dmitri Pittas, tenor; Blair McMillen, piano
Publisher: Bill Holab Music: http://www.billholabmusic.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=103_137&products_id=914
Online Perusal Score: https://issuu.com/robertpaterson/docs/batter_s_box_fs_bound
For More Information: https://robertpaterson.com/batters-box

PROGRAM NOTES
Batter's Box is my second song cycle written in collaboration with Bridget Meeds, a poet, and Kenny Berkowitz, a journalist. The first project we worked on together was Thursday, a song cycle for soprano and piano in which the text consists of fictitious answering machine messages. This time, we specifically decided to tackle a subject that we thought might entice people into the concert hall who might not normally attend classical concerts. The text is loosely based on the life of baseball giant Mike Piazza of the New York Mets. Each movement represents a different phase of the game, and Piazza’s thoughts of his father tie everything together. However, overall, I interpret this cycle as being less about Piazza the individual and more about the all-American baseball player.

Winter Songs

Batter's Box - 3. Rain Delay

Je chante des chaussettes perdues
( I sing of the lost socks)
Parties et disparues,
(Gone and vanished)
Laissant leurs partenaires impairs.
(Leaving their partners unmatched)
Au désespoir je ne peux rien faire.
(Despairing - I can do nothing )
J'ai fouillé dans chaque tiroir,
(I have rummaged in every drawer)
Sous mon lit, au fond de l'armoire.
(Under my bed, at the back of the wardrobe)
C'est toujours la même histoire,
(Always the same story)
Les chaussettes perdues.
(The lost socks)

Pourquoi elles sont parties 
(Why they left)
On ne le saura jamais.
(One will never know)
Elles n'ont rien dit
(They said nothing)
Mais elles s'en sont allées;
(But they went away)

Et en s'en allant 
(And by going away)
Elles  m'ont brisé le coeur.
(They broke my heart)
Et moi, je soupire, je pleure et enfin je meurs.
(As for me, I sigh, I weep and in the end I die)

Et celles qui restent ne servent à rien  
(And those that remain are useless)
Se moquent de moi d'un air villain
(Laugh at me evilly)
Inutiles et superflueuses,
(Useless and superfluous)
Elles comme moi sont malheureuses.
(They like me are unhappy)

Disparus sont mes sourires
(Vanished are my smiles)
Je vis avec mes souvenirs.
(I live with my memories)
Plus de joie dams ma maudite vie
(No more joy in my accursed life)
A cause des chaussettes désunies  !
(Because of the separated socks)

Tim Holden 23/06/16   


La Chanson des Chaussettes Perdues

Convergence

Download

A song about a sore loser

LYRICS:

Rained, four years
Shamed, the crowd cheers
Lied your way down
Hide, your time’s out

If you dare come back home again
You’ll see us sky high on the wind

Throw your toys out the pram and you stamp your feet
Phone the boys in the club, they don’t wanna meet
All the words and the rage, they don't mean the same as they did yesterday cos it’s all in the game
Pride comes before a fall
And you thought you had it all

Reigned for years
Shamed, the crowd cheers
Lied your way down
Hide, your time’s out

Orange Baby

Fourth track from my debut EP 'armored goosebump'. Original is a poem in Dutch by me, written during the Corona pandemic in April of 2020, which got published on the website coronagedicht.nl About forced isolation and the tension that can bring in a relationship. Hope you like it and thanks for the love!

Lyrics & vocals by me
Music & production by Martijn van Dijk
https://soundcloud.com/meneervandijk
Official release streamingservices 2021

Now with video: https://youtu.be/ErwU-O7w5rQ

Happy days

I’m so happy that it’s you
that irritates me more
for you it’s my
persistent whining

We both had our fill
fed up until
we fuck for none to see
while crying

All work out, it will
all work out
every single thing
fucking annoying

Every little thing
worth anything

At least we have each other, love
at least we have each other
we’ve got ourselves 
a life at home worth trying 
at least we have each other

I’m keeping you upright
(afraid to sleep we got a bed light)
keeping me uptight
counting tears
and ways to taunt me

You’re happy to flee
(share a world that’s slowly shrinking)
I irritate you though 
I don’t know 
Who else I could be

All work out, it must
all work out
every little thing 
is worth everything

Every single thing
(you say and throw my way)
the games we play

At least we have each other, love
at least we have each other
we’ve got ourselves 
a life at home worth crying for 
at least we have each other, love

And now one cat is sick
(we beat ourselves with wishful thinking)
it won’t eat
I love you
for trying to feed it

One more stupid thing
(eating badly, started drinking)
making me cry
sad but true 
I really need it

All work out, it must
all work out
every little thing
worth anything

Every single thing
(you say and throw my way)
every single day

At least we have each other, love
at least we have each other
we’ve got ourselves 
a life at home worth dying for 
at least we have each other, love

Armored Goosebumps

happy days

Happy Days

Hoping For A Sunrise

Man Like Me

Une Sérénade En France

Stay Movin

Recorded  mid 2000s
(c)2021  Guitar, Vocals, Bass, Composing, programing, recording, mixing and mastering by Robert Grigg

Missing The Life

"Béla Kiss" is an old gothic tale. Since I wrote it about the 1900's Hungarian serial killer for which the song is titled , I sing in both English & my old native tongue of Hungarian.

Lyrics
Bela la la Bela Kiss
A new alias in the charade of loor
Tinman's echo inside the fisherman's cave
Spinning bootlegged bottles on spirit boards
The last soldier to survive the plague
Was Bela la la Bela Kiss
Bridesmates drained and keepsaked
Only blood is of value says the nihilist

Hallom teiget Béla Kiss
Jóslás a a sírból 
Béla drága Béla Kiss
Bor és vér,az ég sír
Magábon az esoben
Kosorúsh lányok elestek 
Te eladtad a szerelem
Hon vagy te,Budapestben?

Ch:
Hallom teiget 
A finom méreg
a vad ló's élete
Ez az arcok a tükörben
Hallom teiget 
A te vendéged
A vad ló's élete
Hon vagy te, New Yorkban?

Béla La Béla Kiss
The sane must be warded off
With black roses   
Awashed in widow blood
Lonely widower seeks a bride
Dying harlot next to her impaled fling
Crossed hearts burn to ember
To linger on when you get pissed

Hallják teiget Béla Kiss
A titkos szobából
Agglegéin szerenád
Az eltunik vendéged
Béla draga Béla Kiss
Bor és vér,a a farkas sír
Magábon az esoben
Hon vagy te,Budapestben?

Ch:

Down the Carpati hills
Procession of wolves 
Abide by the voices
They are hungry and cruel
Did you soldier onward?
Taking the fallen man's name
Your ghost ship still sits
Above skulls never claimed
Your secrets remain shut
Between the housekeeper's lips
They will lower their weapons
If you aim is to miss
Chaste spirits of the defiled
Pickled in rummed bile 
Did the hard rain makes you smile?
For it's been a long while

2020

Béla Kiss

Get Some Money

Get Some Money(Feat. Pricetag)

American composer Robert Paterson is a true New Yorker—born and bred in Buffalo, he lived in Rochester and Ithaca for over ten years, in New York City for over twenty years, and now lives in Saratoga Springs, near the Adirondacks. Paterson’s colorful music embraces a wide variety of themes, everything from goddesses and online dating to mathematics and the environment. His music is filled with emotion and fierce rhythmic energy, marked by elegance, wit, and meticulous craftsmanship. Named Composer of The Year by the Classical Recording Foundation at Carnegie Hall, Paterson is the winner of the Alfred I. DuPont Award, and his opera Three Way won the Grammy® under Best Classical Producer of the Year. His music is often a Best of the Year pick on National Public Radio. His orchestral tone poem, Dark Mountains, regularly airs on NPR’s Performance Today. Three Way premiered with Nashville Opera, then BAM (Brooklyn Academy of Music), and across the United States. Minnesota Orchestra, Louisville Orchestra, The Oratorio Society of New York, Buffalo Philharmonic, Albany Pro Musica, Albany Symphony, Musica Sacra, Austin Symphony, Vermont Symphony, and ensembles worldwide perform his works. Paterson gives masterclasses at the Curtis Institute of Music, New York University, the Aspen Music Festival, the Cleveland Institute of Music, and more. He is the Artistic Director and house composer for Mostly Modern Projects. Robert is a lifelong vegan and advocates for animals and the environment, celebrating the natural world with ground-breaking works such as his Triple Concerto, A New Eaarth, Listen, and I Go Among Trees.

Batter's Box - 3. Rain Delay

Robert Paterson Composer