SATB + piano
Editor’s Choice, J.W. Pepper

NOTE FROM THE COMPOSER

Described as “mad, bad and dangerous to know,” Lord Byron is one of Britain’s greatest poets. He was known for his brilliant use of the English language, as well as his flamboyant lifestyle and romantic escapades. Scholars believe that Byron wrote She Walks in Beauty in 1814 when he met his cousin, Mrs. John Wilmont. It is an innocent poem, with seemingly only admiration of the subject’s outer physical beauty and inner peace. Byron feels that the person’s beauty is a perfect union of dark and light. The cloudless night is filled with soft starlight. She exudes a captivating purity, almost an expression of the divine.