The Darling Song Cycle

The Darling Song Cycle is a work of original songs by composer Edward Schocker and lyricist Greg Giovanni. Inspired by relationships of The Darling Family in the story Peter Pan, the subject matter of this domestic drama ranges from funny to sad to absurd -all with images and wordplay that children and adults find meaningful. This work delves deep to investigate the relationship between content and form and experiments with new storytelling approaches that expand theatrical and musical vocabularies.

“After much research, Edward and I chose to create songs based on the story of Peter Pan, and specifically regarding the characters of Mr. and Mrs. Darling and their relationship to their children leaving home for Neverland” - Greg Giovani

Goal of the piece

Through The Darling Song Cycle, Edward and Greg are striving to create a unique style of storytelling through words, music and action that can be meaningful at many different levels for both adults and children. Just as the tales of years past that have been with us through our childhood and adult life, we hope The Darling Song Cycle will become a work that “grows up” with all of us. 

The music was originally written for a live band consisting of guitar, upright bass, and violin along with a male soprano and female tenor.

• The Band (The Darlings)

• Tako Oda –voice of Mr. and Mrs. Darling

• Tomoko Schocker –voice of Mr. and Mrs. Darling

• Sarah Willner –violin

• Sean Carson –upright bass

• Edward Schcoker -composer

This work has been performed in both adult and family settings at Berkeley Arts Festival, Theatre of Yugen, Oakland Museum of California and Vessel Gallery.

The Darling Song Cycle was created with the support of the East Bay Community Foundation's East Bay Fund for Artists and the Zellerbach Family Foundation and partially commissioned by Theatre of Yugen.