Lili Boulanger (1893 - 1918) wrote the piece, Dans l'immense tristesse (In Immense Sadness) for voice and piano, in 1916, three years after she had won the Prix de Rome, and two years before she died. Because of her constant ill health and resulting melancholy, Lili seemed drawn to texts and pieces that conveyed a certain bittersweet sadness. She may have identified with the feelings that these poems and musical works evoked within her. Her fascination with the Maurice Maeterlinck (1862 - 1949) symbolic drama, La Princesse Maleine, in which the heroine combats incredibly difficult life experiences, and in the end has a tragic fate, may have brought out in Lili the unhappiness she felt in often being left alone, confined to the house due to illness, and her possibly unconscious knowledge that she would live a short life.

It is this type of symbolist poetry that Lili was also attracted to, and to which the text of Dans l'immense tristesse is set. Lili found the text to this song quite by accident. A deaf, mute, and blind woman she had met through a friend wrote it. Lili was impressed by this older woman who had succeeded in marrying and raising children, in addition to writing a book of poetry. Since Lili had her own health handicaps, the woman's accomplishments were an inspiration to her, as was her poetry. It is the text of this woman's, Mme. B. Galeron de Calone, to which Lili set her sad song. The poem speaks of a sad silence in a cemetery. A woman walks through, disturbing the peaceful scene. The poem asks what she wants—perhaps some treasure under a stone, or to see a small child who sleeps there. The mother is looking for her child, although she comes not to save the child, but to sing the child to rest.

Any poem or story about the death of a child is extremely sad, and this is no exception. Lili conveys this sadness in her music by a slow tempo, evenly spaced piano chords in the accompaniment, and a wistful woman's voice singing above. When the text speaks of what the woman comes to seek—a child—the piano chords become very dissonant, in contrast to the rest of the piece. The piece would not be called consonant by any means; but these few low chords are so dissonant that they stand out in particular. The piece then slightly moves to a faster tempo, but soon slows to almost a halt and a whisper at the end of the song, when the text speaks of the sleeping child. Chromaticism dominates the work, although this is almost resolved at the end of the piece, when a few notes of a French lullaby play softly in the piano part, after the voice has died out.

Published by Ricordi in 1919, the piece is dedicated to "ma chere Clarie Croiza," a singer who performed Lili Boulanger's works.

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