THE KNOCK ON THE DOOR
Emily Feldberg's Music
UPDATES FROM THE COMPOSER
EMILY FELDBERG'S MUSIC
HOME PAGE
FRAGMENTS:
AUDIO CLIP LINKS
(listed below)
August 1914Abschied LamentCanary Girls

The Knock on the Door
(This page)

Under A Cloudless Blue Sky Kuchen! (Another Mother's Son) Three Tommies Duty Alone Vale Lest we forget
Supported using public funding by ARTS COUNCIL ENGLAND

THE KNOCK ON THE DOOR
Emily Feldberg's Music
UPDATES FROM THE COMPOSER
EMILY FELDBERG'S MUSIC
HOME PAGE
FRAGMENTS:
AUDIO CLIP LINKS
(listed below)
August 1914Abschied LamentCanary Girls

The Knock on the Door
(This page)

Under A Cloudless Blue Sky Kuchen! (Another Mother's Son) Three Tommies Duty Alone Vale Lest we forget
Supported using public funding by ARTS COUNCIL ENGLAND



THE KNOCK ON THE DOOR a setting from
Fragments: Voices from the First World War



DETAILS AND TEXTS.

The Knock on the Door (Conscientious Objectors):
Composer's note: Perhaps one of the few good things to come out of the conflict was the recognition in law of conscientious objection. Britain was the only country to recognise 'exemption on grounds of conscience', in the Military Service Act of 1916. I wanted to let the words stand clear of the instrumentation here, so I have used a reduced orchestration, mainly strings and French Horn. The texts used span more than 350 years of debate over pacifism, conscription and war, from the 1661 Quaker Peace Testimony, to the 1915 No Conscription Fellowship Manifesto, to the 2016 reflections of a contemporary Quaker, David Boulton (from whose words the title of this section is drawn12) on the centenary of the first Military Service Act. They also draw on three voices from the public and parliamentary debate which preceded the Act: pro-conscription military writer Dr H Miller ('By George, I'd have [universal] military training in heaven!'), House of Lords member Richard Verney, lord Willoughby de Broke (conscription for 'gentlemen' only, as an example to the lower classes) and Independent Labour Party MP Keir Hardie: 'Conscription is the badge of the slave' 13

Texts:

The knock on the door
All bloody practices we do utterly deny
and all outward wars and strife
and fighting with outward weapons for any end
or under any pretence [12]

Conscription or not

'By George! I'd have military training in Heaven!'
'Conscription just for the upper classes
as an example to the lower classes.'
'Conscription is the badge of the slave.' [13]

We deny the right of any government
to make a bounden duty the slaughter of our fellows.

Enlist or desert
Exemption on grounds of conscience
Every man who is single must register to enlist
or become a deserter
That knock on the door, that knock on the door
that brings the great decision

I've made the great decision.
All bloody practices we do utterly deny
All outward wars and strife
and fighting with outward weapons for any end.
This is our testimony to the whole world.

REFERENCES:

12 The 1661 Quaker Peace Testimony, quoted in 2 March 1916: D-day for conscientious objectors by David Boulton (2016) in the Friend, Vol 174, no. 9, p. 5. (Special Issue, 26 February 2016). The title of this section is from the same article: 'None would ever forget that knock on the door, on or after 2 March 1916.' Used by kind permission of the author.
13 All from The politics of conscription and conscience by David Boulton (2016) in the Friend, Vol 174, no. 9, p. 8. (Special Issue, 26 February 2016).


Emily Feldberg's Music

© Emily Feldberg 2017-2018.