Story Behind In Flanders Fields Video

IN FLANDERS FIELDS SONG
Music Video – View it on Youtube
© 2007 Anthony Hutchcroft

The inspiration for the Flanders Fields video came from the composer’s wife Lee Kwidzinski, who is also the video’s director and dance choreographer.

Kwidzinski fell in love with the In Flanders Fields song and found her inspiration for the choreography from the opening image of the video, a 1917 black and white photo of crosses “row on row” in Essex Farm Cemetery, where John McCrae buried his close friend Alexis Helmer the day before McCrae wrote his famous In Flanders Fields poem.

Throughout the Flanders Fields video, especially in the opening and closing sequences, the central theme utilized is the image of the cross.

Kwidzinski chose “white” costuming because she wanted the dancers to be symbolic of the “row on row” of white crosses. She also opens (and closes) the Flanders Fields video with the camera above the dancers in order to give the same perspective as the image in the photograph.

The effect on video is a haunting, ghostly image that many viewers have interpreted to be angels or spirits of the fallen walking among the crosses of the graveyard In Flanders Fields.

In his In Flanders Fields poem, John McCrae’s use of imagery has since become a part of our collective memory of war. It is this “visual” aspect of the poem that Kwidzinski wanted to capture in her choreography.

As you view the Flanders Fields video, watch for some of these images depicted by the dancers:

• “row on row” (of crosses)
• “the guns below”
• “loved and were loved”
• “take up our quarrel”
• “the torch be yours to hold it high”

In order to prepare for the Flanders Fields video, Kwidzinski shared photos, WWI facts and stories with her dancers to give them a clear understanding of what war might have been like and what the soldiers might have gone through.

In the first verse of the Flanders Fields video, Kwidzinski wanted to clearly establish the theme of the cross.

The video’s second verse depicts the tragedy of war, the darker side where the young soldiers become the “unsettled dead” after being drawn into a war that they may not have understood.

The third verse of the Flanders Fields video interprets the battle. The dancers in the semi-circle (standing behind the two fighters) are symbolic of the young soldiers involved in a war without fully understanding why or what they are meant to do…watching the fighting at first, until they finally drawn in as part of the battle. The soldiers eventually have to carry their own wounded or dead and bear the burden of being the ones that “survived”.

While nearly all of the dancers for the Flanders Fields video were familiar with the In Flanders Fields poem and remember reciting the poem at school, they commented afterwards that this was the first time they had thought about the meaning of words or actually remembered the words to John McCrae’s In Flanders Fields poem.

It was for this very reason that composer Anthony Hutchcroft created the In Flanders Fields song.

Since the release of the In Flanders Fields song several people from around the globe have created their own video interpretation to the music. Here are two examples:

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View Flanders Fields Video #2
Video interpretation by “nonpareils”
of Anthony Hutchcroft’s instrumental version of the
 FLANDERS FIELDS SONG

View Flanders Fields Video #3
Video interpretation by Belgium’s “swijski”
of Anthony Hutchcroft’s vocal version of the
 FLANDERS FIELDS SONG

“Visit the Flanders Fields CD page to purchase the In Flanders Fields song.
You can also purchase Flanders Fields Sheet Music
in Piano/Vocal or SATB Choir arrangement.