Ex. 4-11: Sur la plage

"Sur la plage" (On the Shore, W 286), composed in 1892 to a poem by Édouard Guinand.

The poem opens with "La vague vient sans cesse apporter au rivage" (The wave comes to the shore without end). A woman has been left by her lover. The waves never stop breaking on the beach, and they remind her of her own sorrow, which also never ends. In the piano, a rolling pattern describes the waves moving in and out.

Published by Enoch (Paris) and Schirmer (New York) in 1892–1893. Guinand was a French poet whose verses Chaminade set in several other songs as well.

From the album Women of Music Songs by Urszula Kryger and Agata Górska-Kołodziejska (2019)
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