1940
Look Down, Fair Moon
Composed by Charles Naginski
Text by 
Walt Whitman
Walt Whitman “Look Down, Fair Moon” is from Walt Whitman's collection of Civil War poetry Drum-Taps, published in 1865.
Audio
Look Down, Fair Moon
Thomas Hampson (baritone) & Craig Rutenberg (piano)2:32
Look Down, Fair Moon
Thomas Hampson (baritone) & Wolfram Rieger (piano)2:59
About
Walt Whitman volunteered in the hospitals of Washington, D.C. during much of the Civil War, and he was profoundly moved by the experience. In Naginski’s setting of “Look Down, Fair Moon,” piano and voice reflect as stunned comrades upon the tragic essence of the poet’s words.
Text
Look Down, Fair Moon
by Walt Whitman
Look down, fair moon and bathe this scene,
Pour softly down night’s nimbus floods, on faces ghastly, swollen, purple;
On the dead, on their backs, with arms toss’d wide,
Pour down your unstinted nimbus, sacred moon.
Related Information
The Hampsong Foundation
hampsongfoundation.org/to-the-soul-song-texts-and-translations/#lookdownnaginskiInstant Encore
instantencore.com/music/details.aspx?PId=5041048Sheet Music