Do you know the song of wood thrushes as dusk begins and the coolness of an early autumn air holds their warbling between high trees? That is the question posed by this record. So, do you? These words and much more (see the back cover of “Arthur Fiedler/Boston Pops – Embraceable You” below) were written by Clare W Van Ausdall. Not much is known about her except that she was commissioned to write for many record releases, back cover notes, booklets and across a range of genres. That’s the kind of job I’d like. Just a shame there are no vacancies any more.
Sleeve Notes:
Do you know the song of wood thrushes as dusk begins and the coolness of an early autumn air holds their warbling between high trees? Or do you know the little murmur of a thousand night moths near the river’s edge, their wings luminous like milky dust in the violet light of evening? Can you summon up the echo of rain or the trees’ sighing, the transformation of a seashell held against your ear or the rustle of a brocaded skirt on a pebbled walk? Remember these things, for they can be the sounds of Love.
Have you seen the yellow sunlight lying suddenly on a pink cheek, the arch of elms in some springtime meadow, a pair of playful smiles coming together like the winking image of goldfish seen through the surface of pond water? Or the gleam of ripe grapes picked together in clusters, or the blue-outlined, ivory-centered flame of a candle, or the elaborate fancy of a garden spider’s web, serene, immaculate on an early morning? Remember these things, for they can have the look of Love. Perhaps you recall the scent of emperor poppies at midnight, or the tang of wet hickory logs in a country fireplace, the clear bitey smell of pine needles rimed with frost, the natural perfume of the skin fresh from salt water and the froth of the sea. Remember them; they can be the fragrance of Love.
If you know the sounds of Love, the looks of Love, the fragrances of Love – the splendors of Love, we might call them – then you know the music of Love, the music of shadows and dews, starlight and sunshine, of cool woodland flutes, of violins in various colors of repose.
When two people love each other, the things they see together, hear together, become aware of together are precious for all time. Those are the things the music of Love immortalizes. Nightingales sing about them, poets write of them. The songs you will encounter in this album, for instance, are longs of Love for Love’s sake, full of Love’s beauty. There is the sound of nightingales and poetry to them. And the sound of splendor.
CLAIR W. VAN AUSDALL
Label: Camden CDS 1096
