With In Nature, the gentlest mother, written in 1949, we are in a blissful state. Emily Dickinson’s exquisite text is rendered with brilliant musical imagery by Aaron Copland (who, like The Year’s at the Spring, was born in 1900). His depiction of nature’s silence—through widely stretched-out chords and broad vocal intervals—is startling in its effect. The tumult, as well, of her creatures and plants is brought to musical life through Copland’s special genius. How magical too are Emily Dickinson’s descriptions of sleeping children, peeping stars and the setting sun in the closing two stanzas.

from notes by Robert White © 1997