Into Your Hands

Songs for the Journey was originally commissioned to be a companion piece to the Fauré Requiem. I have long admired this work for its personal tone, and for the way in which Fauré emphasized the beauty and intimacy of the traditional Latin texts. In assembling the movements of Songs for the Journey, I chose texts with uniquely personal stories and connections. The opening movement, Into Your Hands, is based on Psalm 31:5, and an excerpt from Confessions by St. Augustine. It also includes a brief harmonic reference to Fauré’s Requiem. Together, the five movements of Songs for the Journey explore similar themes as the traditional requiem—love, faith, and mortality—but in a non-liturgical framework, with poems and texts drawn from a variety of sources.

Into your hands, O Lord
I commend my spirit.

You have made us for yourself
and our hearts are restless
until they find peace in you.