Tenor: Luke Honeck
Piano: Daphne Thomas
Violin: Abi Keefe

Annabel Lee

The Road Not Taken

Les Roses D'Octobre

No.1 Lust Der Sturmnacht

Ah, Love, But A Day!

The Year's At The Spring

No.1 Zu spät!
No.2 Vorbei!

Tenor: Luke Honeck
Cello: Linda Ottum
Piano: Susan Reed

Selections from Vier Lieder, W. Rabl

Soprano: Elisabeth Burmeister
Trumpet: David Deacon
Piano: John Austin Clark

Rudyard Kipling’s collection Epitaphs of the War was inspired by his direct experience with World War I. Kipling was a staunch supporter of the British war effort, using his celebrity to spread war propaganda for the British government as well as serving as a reporter in the French trenches. His son, John Kipling, was sixteen years old at the start of the war. Inspired by his father’s patriotism, John tried to join the Royal Navy and then the army but was rejected by both due to his severe short-sightedness. Rudyard, however, insisted John go to war. He used his political clout to land John a position as Second Lieutenant of the 2nd Battalion, Irish Guards. Within a matter of weeks, the newly 18-year-old fell in the Battle of Loos on French soil. Rudyard and his wife, Caroline Starr Balestier, traveled to France in search of their lost son, but to no avail. For the rest of the War, Kipling would process his grief, guilt, and frustration with Britain’s performance on the war front through the creation of Epitaphs. Modeled on The Greek Anthology, Epitaphs of the War is comprised of epitaphs and epigrams of fictitious people who each represent some facet of those Kipling met between 1914 and 1918.
My goal in setting Epitaphs was in part to memorialize this period in Kipling’s life. As the project continued, however, I also wanted to use this as an opportunity to explore the traumatic effects of blind patriotism. I view this cycle as the story of two soldiers, separated in time, in WWI. The first soldier, represented by “The Wonder,” “The Sleepy Sentinel,” and “The Rebel,” is a proud patriot who joins the military of his own volition, hoping to find a stronger sense of self. He falls asleep at his post and, as was custom at the time, is executed by the State. He then spends the rest of eternity questioning God about his fate, and the fate of humankind. The other character, represented by “The Coward,” and “The Favor,” follows the short life of a citizen who, as the war drags on, is conscripted to the armed forces. He knows he cannot desert the army but cannot stand the horrors of war. Wanting to preserve his honor, he puts himself directly in the line of enemy fire and achieves his freedom. The four songs that bookend these characters utilize themes drawn from British military music of WWI. These Greek chorus-style reflections lean on God Save the Queen, The Last Post, Royal Air Force March Past, and ends with the trumpet using morse code to wire the Journalist’s final message, “We have served our day.” – Luke Honeck, composer

Luke Honeck Music

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