These song cycles on war poetry were written for David Ripley after a 1982 piano version of the first book. They’ve been associated with him ever since. All poems are from the First World War and are unsparingly violent. The poets were the flower of Europe and well-versed in the classics. When thrown into war (and some didn’t live to see the end of it) they had to tools to fully express the horror.

There is currently no score that I can make available.

This performance is from 2003. Ripley has performed both books of songs a number of times, most recently in 2009.