A set of four songs on poems by James Joyce for soprano and piano.

From the composer:

Written between 1958 and 1960, these songs are the first of my compositions involving voice. Unlike the James Joyce settings that were to follow and my many settings of Lewis Carroll, these vocal lines are relatively simple and unadorned. The high-flying, extraverted virtuosity of that later style is a different world from these smoothly flowing, conjunct lines which are written well within the treble staff and attempt to evoke moods of lieder-like intimacy and youthful romantic yearning.

Rather than the traditional vocal 'accompaniment,' the piano parts for these songs are really more like tiny piano concertos and were written to be performed by myself at a time when I was still an aspiring piano virtuoso. They are florid and elaborate-swirling embroideries of notes surrounding the voice with (what seems to me NOW) an almost reckless abandon.