Five Monstrous Songs (for female voice and piano)

Five songs from the opera The Monstrous Child arranged for female voice and piano.

The five songs in this cycle are drawn from my opera The Monstrous Child. Based on the novel by Francesca Simon, the opera tells the tale of Hel, the half-goddess, half-corpse daughter of Loki and ruler of the Norse underworld who is fated to destroy the world. In the songs presented here I have loosely attempted to stay faithful to the opera’s narrative. Beginning with A Monstrous Birth, Hel and her two monstrous brothers – the snake Jörmungandr and the wolf Fenrir – are born to their giantess mother, Angrboda. Bìum Bìum Bambaló sees Hel singing a monstrous lullaby and dreaming about escaping her broken home. In So, What’s Happened? We are given an update on all that’s happened since Hel was banished to underworld by the god Odin. My Name in his Mouth see’s Hel fantasising about the imminent arrival of the beautiful god Baldr to the world of the dead; and finally in Hel’s Fate, Hel accepts her destiny and destroys the world as Ragnarok begins.

1.) A Monstrous Birth

2.) Bìum Bìum Bambaló

3.) So, What’s Happened?

4.) My Name in his Mouth

5.) Hel’s Fate

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