What Child is This? is a new setting of the famous carol, with a melody attributed to Henry VIII and lyrics by William Chatterton Dix. The music has a modal language, with a medieval style that tries to describe the tenderness, simplicity and expression of the text. It begins with an introduction to set the scene, which serves as an interlude between the three stanzas. The first stanza presents the main melody, very simple and innocent, in the manner of a lullaby which climaxes in ‘Haste!’. The second stanza contains soft melismas in the voices accompanying the melody. In the third stanza the harmony of the beginning changes slightly, and the leaps in the melody are greater, producing more emphasis. In the final coda, a Mezzo-soprano solo performs a brief quotation of Greensleeves' famous melody, in a fusion of tradition and modernity.
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