- Hanson wrote his seventh and final symphony, “A Sea Symphony,” in 1977. The piece is scored for chorus and orchestra and sets poetry from Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass (1855):
- Lo, the unbounded sea
- The untold want
- Joy, shipmate, joy!
- Hanson wrote Symphony No. 7 to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the National Music Camp at Interlochen, a summer training center for the performing arts near Traverse City, Michigan.
- Hanson’s oeuvre includes several settings of Whitman’s poetry, including Six Songs Opp. 2 and 3, Three Songs from ‘Drum Taps,’ Song of Democracy, and The Mystic Trumpeter.
- You can view the Whitman text that Hanson chose for Symphony No. 7 here.
Cut IDs
45897