1. |
To Cassandra
02:25
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Darling, come see
the rose so red,
Which this morn
timidly had spread
Her mantle to
the eye of day.
Come see if she has
lost this e'en
Her crimson pleated
robe's soft sheen,
That same blush
which on your
cheek plays.
See how in but
a paltry hour
She has let fall
her ailing flower.
Her beauty lies
there in the dust!
Alas! How cruel
is Mother Nature,
Since such a blossom
can endure
Only from trembling
dawn to dusk.
Darling you must
indeed believe,
Whilst innocence
within you cleaves
The bud and blooms
in purity,
Garner the gifts
of tender youth,
For, like this flower,
age in sooth
Will sadly spoil
and tarnish beauty.
[poem by S N Solomons after Ronsard's poem "Mignonne allons voir si la rose"]
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2. |
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Sometimes when you fall asleep,
it seems you take me with you
deep into a peaceful land
far from all the heartache;
that you'll understand one day,
you will understand one day
the quiet way
quiet way you move me
quiet way
quiet way you move me.
Sometimes when you fall asleep
it seems you take me with you,
deep into a peaceful land
far from all the heart ache.
I find myself complete;
I find myself repeating a prayer
and smiling at the sky:
the quiet way you move me
even when you cry.
Now within your drowsy eyes
I can see why the world has lost
all its wonders.
A new dream is rising,
impatient to begin.
A new dream is rising
impatient to begin.
And when the dream is through,
your hungry feelings will find me.
My comfort is you.
My comfort is you.
The quiet way
quiet way you move me
quiet way
quiet way you move me
[poem by Nevil Frenkiel]
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3. |
Romance for Lissie
03:39
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4. |
Song for Jenny
03:25
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Qui e adesso amore mio A Ghemme non so che voglio.
[Here and now, my love. In Ghemme I don't know what I want]
Land of fuzzy fizzy foggy friendliness
Alpine heights and glowing plains
land of lovely people and fruitfulness
village feasts and bobbly trains
Qui e adesso amore mio a Ghemme non so che voglio
My love can hear the bells ring from your steeple
see the mountains in the sun
hear the singing language of your people
smile and dance and sing like none
Qui e adesso amore mio A Ghemme non so che voglio.
Amore mio dove sono
Dove siamo?
[Here and now, my love. In Ghemme I don't know what I want
My love where am I? Where are we?]
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5. |
Cupid, shame yourself
03:47
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Cupid, shame yourself,
For you have touched marble.
You broke a comfortable glacier with hottest arrows,
You dared warm a frozen sea, alien to love,
and showed it tenderness beyond just friends
Cupid, shame yourself,
For your whims have hurt me.
Recall uncomfortable memories with coldest passion.
You iceberg in human form, alien to love,
Please show no tenderness beyond just friends
I was your guitar,
I was the love of your sweet young years
I was your guitar
Cupid, hide yourself,
and keep away from me.
Just let me walk away every time
from all temptation.
Not regard my friend's advice "Give into love
and show it tenderness", oh no my friend.
I was your guitar,
I was the love of your sweet young years
I was your guitar
Cupid, hide yourself,
and keep away from me
just let me walk away every time
from all temptation
Not regard my friend's advice "Give into love
and show it tenderness", oh no my friend.
Give me time to grow wise
Give me time to forget
Cupid!
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6. |
Here in nomansland
02:54
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Here in nomansland
where all had fled the weather
we waited patiently
and enjoyed God's sun together
Here in nomansland
a grandson of Adam
residing in his earthly grandfather's home
the woods and sun presiding
Here in nomansland
Hermes' and Aphrodite's son
sings cuckoo to the ill-shorn mountain top
and then is gone
Here in nomansland we sing
to the other's consolation
whilst peaceful dog and cows look on
at our natural
perchance divine
oration
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7. |
Be not afeard
01:48
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Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices
That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open and show riches
Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked,
I cried to dream again.
(speech spoken by Caliban in Shakespeare's play The Tempest)
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8. |
Wrong side of the door
02:08
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Just let me out just let me out!
Open the door there out to the yard
let me get out there now the cat demands!
I need to stretch sharpen my claws and roam the woody glen
Let me back in let me back in!
Open the door there I must have food,
I can't stay outside.
Let's have some fish! Let's have some fish!
Oh hurry! Be quick or I'll bite!
You call this fresh?
Oh what a liberty!
Just let me out Open the door
A fine fat bird! I must have him now
Just let me out!
The cheeky thing!
He's coming this way... Blast! I've been seen!
Let me back in. Let me back in!
I must have food.
Open a tin now!
Oh what a feast!
My tum needs scratching
Oh stroke me again
That's all I need! (purr).
[English translation by D W Solomons of Je veux sortir by Paul Maertens]
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9. |
Je veux sortir
01:52
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Je veux sortir
je veux sortir!
Ouvrez-moi la porte,
j'ai besoin d'air!
laissez-moi passer,
je suis un chat!
Je dois m'étirer...
faire mes griffes,
rôder dans les bois.
Je veux rentrer
je veux rentrer!
Ouvrez-moi la porte,
J'ai bien trop faim
pour rester dehors.
Je veux du thon!
Je veux du thon!
Plus vite!
Plus vite!
ou je mords!
Ce n'est pas frais!
Ah qu'est-ce que je vois?
Je veux sortir...
Ouvrez-moi la porte ..
Quel bel oiseau
Je suis impatient!
Laissez-moi passer!
Quel impudent!
Il vient par ici...
Zut!
Il m'a vu!
Je veux rentrer!
Je veux rentrer!
Je veux du thon,
ouvrez une boîte!
J'ai bien mangé ...
Qu'est-ce qui me gratte?
Je veux du contact,
et rien de plus.
(prrrp)
(Poem by Paul Maertens - see track above for my English version of the song)
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10. |
Haviranosan no haiku
03:57
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Sunset ragged weeping
down dark wooded hills
fallen leaves choke our path
On lonely country roads
traveller leaves footprints
in thin nightfall snow
Green amid the haze and dust
a lizard darting
shelters from the sun
Forgotten badger-country
secretly whispers
to a shy young flower.
[haikus by Mark Haviland]
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11. |
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You bumbling stupidity of buzzzzz
Striped furriness of fuzzzz
a dangleness of legs
noisily battering against the
unseen solidness of sky's deprivation
does freedom mean so much
that you buzz in fury
yet mean so little
that you scorn the other window's open aid
You bumbling stupidity of buzzzzzz
Striped furriness of fuzzzzz
be calm you furry roundness of anger
Lower frenzy's pitch
Let be gentle guided
to deep hummed content
sun-soaring unconfined
sun-soaring unconfined
(poem by Audrey Vaughan)
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12. |
Ludhe sing tishoo
01:22
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Summer is icumen in ludhè sing tishoo.
Flower bloweth hooter gloweth all the summer noo!
Summer is icumen in ludhè sing. Ludhè sing.
Summer is icumen in ludhè sing tishoo
Pollen clingeth in the nasal passages anew.
Sing tishoo. Sing tishoo. Sing tishoooooo!
Summer is icumen in ludhè sing tishoo
Breathing wheezeth hooter sneezeth
misery for you
Sing tishoo! Sing tishoo, noo:
pocket floweth over with the hankies soaked through!
Sing tish. Sing tish ...tchoo!
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13. |
Christmas Song
03:40
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I sought him where the marble shone
and rang with singing echoes
to the hurrying prelates' feet and
found him not I sought him where the golden glow
and painted heav'n-eyed saints adorn the sleeping altars
and found him not
I sought him where all nature's beauty burned
with autumn leaves afire with death
against the long blue sky
and found him not
I sought him down the stone sett streets
dull beneath the misty rain
which closed the surrounding hills
and found him not
I sought him in the eyes of strangers
bright with giving thoughts
and in the hearts of friends
but found him not
I sought him
him whom I loved
in ev'ry thing I loved
in my own heart's loving
but this night I found him not
I found him not
but still I sought him
this gurgling boy of joy but where?
the dark sky all above and round me
like a suffocating empty cloak
took time away
my thoughts away
my search away
and the peace of emptiness of self
opened the low brown door
and there his newness tiny lay
deep in the shriven hollow of my heart
cradled there
I found him
(poem by Audrey Vaughan)
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14. |
Judas (home performance)
02:44
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Judas
Under the moon in the dark, dark sky,
silver stabbed with stars
and drifting with the shadow scattering clouds,
I stand, and my hand is full of blood.
If the stars were eyes,
they could not see so well
as the dark, deep sky sees the deep, dark mirror of my soul;
and my heart is cold as the moon.
The tentacles of clouds,
wind-whipped, curling,
creep slowly tight around my throat:
a thought; a grief; and end?
But, living now, the writhing branches of a death
sweet oblivion beckon,
and play a mocking sparkle with the stars;
and the rasping corded whisper,
snake-like, sinuous, roars into my ears...
And a hand drops thirty silver tears of blood.
(poem by Audrey Vaughan)
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15. |
As gleams the rosebud
02:45
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As gleams the rosebud in the month of May,
in her first flush of youth and velvet flower,
rendering Heaven jealous of her colour,
brimming with dawn tears at the break of day.
Within her petals love and grace both dwell,
perfuming all the gardens and the trees.
Yet stricken by the rain or heat,
she dies swooning away, with petals all unfurled;
and so it was, fresh in your tender years,
when earth and sky lauded your comeliness.
Fate has struck you down.Ashes alone are left.
In tender memory receive my tears,
a sad libation to refresh these posies,
so that, alive or dead, you are but roses.
(Translation by S N Solomons of Ronsard's poem:
Comme on voit sur la branche au mois de May la rose)
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16. |
Rose
02:19
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There is a rose in my garden,
a crimson rose opening in my heart.
Rosy cheeks blossoming like a young pomegranate plant,
which loves the earth like spring.
Like a rising sun in the sky,
both weep, both love from within.
Like a rising moon in the night,
like summer rain watering my rose garden,
as if it were a life.
It is you in my dreams at night;
ev'ry moment I see you in my mind;
you are running through my soul
like blood runs through my veins
with joy.
[translation of a poem in Turkish by
"İskan Açıkça"
Bir gülüm var bahçemde
Açıldı yüreğim deki kızıl gül
Al al yanakları
Nar fidan gibi çiçek açmış
Topraǧı sevdigi kadar
İlkbahar mevsimi gibi
Gök-yüzüne doǧan güneş gibi
Hem aǧlar
Hem sever içten içe
Geceleri doǧar ay gibi
Yaz yaǧmuru akar gibi
Suluyor gülbahçemi
Bir hayat gibi
Geceler rüyamda sensin
Her an kardeşim hayalsin
Ruhuma akıp gidiyorsun
Damarımdakı kan gibi
Coşup gidiyorsun.]
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17. |
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Judas
Under the moon in the dark, dark sky,
silver stabbed with stars
and drifting with the shadow scattering clouds,
I stand, and my hand is full of blood.
If the stars were eyes,
they could not see so well
as the dark, deep sky sees the deep, dark mirror of my soul;
and my heart is cold as the moon.
The tentacles of clouds,
wind-whipped, curling,
creep slowly tight around my throat:
a thought; a grief; and end?
But, living now, the writhing branches of a death
sweet oblivion beckon,
and play a mocking sparkle with the stars;
and the rasping corded whisper,
snake-like, sinuous, roars into my ears...
And a hand drops thirty silver tears of blood.
(poem by Audrey Vaughan)
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David Warin Solomons Sale, UK
Composer from UK born in 1953, concentrating on lyrical and tonal works for chamber music combinations, solo voice and choral works.
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