The text, compiled by Jan and myself, is simply a list of favorite beverages we each have discovered in our travels. Like the third movement, the finale is a waltz, though this time it is slowed down to an appropriate tempo. The fourth movement is an arrangement of the aforementioned “The Anacreontic Song,” its melody most famous as the national anthem of the United States. Three verses from the GAUDEAMUS IGITUR follow in the very German-sounding second movement, while the central movement sets Hilaire Belloc’s delightful poem “On the Excellence of Burgundy Wine” as a fast waltz that keeps stumbling over itself. The brief opening movement features a setting of William Butler Yeats’ “A Drinking Song” for voice alone, and possesses the distinction of being a rare, purposefully atonal drinking song yet written. When I set out to write the piece, I determined that I wanted it to contain both original music and arrangements. Accordingly, the cycle features two arrangements of rather well known tunes, the GAUDEAMUS IGITUR and “The Anacreontic Song” (from whence the work derives its title). The piece was written for my friend, the mezzo-soprano Jan Zimmerman, who shares with me an appreciation for some of the finer libations one typically encounters only in Europe. Performance Note: “To Anacreon in Heaven…” is a set of five drinking songs that were written between September 2006 and August 2007, then slightly revised before the first performance in April 2009.

Premiere: 26 April 2009 at Gordon College, Wenham, MA. Jan Zimmerman, mezzo-soprano Michael Monroe, piano

Gaudeamus igitur instrumental