Support London Song Festival Saturday Nov 7th, 2pm ROADS TO SOLACE Concert 3 - He That Dwells in Shadows The Songs and Poetry of Ivor Gurney (1890-1937) Olivia Boen – soprano Camille Lemonnier – piano John Rayment – speaker Programme devised by Nigel Foster Songs (typed in black) Readings (typed in grey) The dearness of common things Beechwood, tea, plate shelves And the whole family of crockery, wood-axes, blades, helves Ivory milk, earth’s coffee, The white face of books, And the touch, feel, smell of paper - Latin’s lovely looks. Earth fine to handle; The touch of clouds, When the imagining arm leaps out to caress Grey worsted or wool clouds. Wool, rope, cloth, old pipes Gone, warped in service; And the one herb of tobacco, The herb of grace, the censer weed; Of whorled, blue, finger-traced curves. A holiday in Cornwall that Christmas; …a grey land of blue sea and frowning cliffs of might. Boulders outcropping in all conceivable places. Great winds and dashing spray, clear stars, gulls, cormorants, rooks, a wishing well, old and dangerous-to-the-unwary- Support London Song Festival traveller pitshafts. Surely the great Symphony in C minor will come out of this (pray that it may not resemble Brahms!) Gurney didn’t write a symphony, but he did write a song: Desire in Spring Song 1 - Desire in Spring (Francis Ledwidge, 1887-1917) I love the cradle songs the mothers sing In lonely places where the twilight drops, The slow endearing melodies that bring Sleep to the weeping lids; and when she stops, I love the roadside birds upon the tops Of dusty hedges in a world of Spring. And when the rain drips from the edge Of midday wind, the meadows lean one way, And a long whisper passes through the sedge, Beside the broken water let me stay, While these old airs upon my memory play, And silent changes colour up the hedge. The following January he resumed his studies at the Royal College of Music If there be foolish folk intending to study that difficult but fascinating Siren of Music at close quarters, such I intend to trap and having enticed to doom, suck dry. Song 2 - The Singer (Edward Shanks, 1892-1953) In the dim light of the golden lamp The singer stands and sings, And the songs rise up like coloured bubbles Or birds with shining wings. And the movement of the merry or plaintive keys Sounds in the silent air. Till the listener feels the room no more But only music there. And still from the sweet and rounded mouth The delicate songs arise, Like floating bubbles whose colours are The coloured melodies. Girl of the lovely singing. O well-borne one That standest for music like some poplar wood Delicately carved – O when my utterance dies Support London Song Festival We hang on the cadence like a wind in coolness. London life, though very different to his native Gloucestershire, exhilarated him. Thunder Of trams and buses crammed, or Saturday-night-damned- Up, seething, dodging, Grumbling, laughing, over-busy Crowd in Mile End crammed; Or in one hour of joys When football plays Marvellous music on these jigging heart-strings, And one lucky kick brings Battle-winning in a Niagara of noise. Or in sight of a painted Pace, through the tainted Smoke-blue atmosphere Of Music-Hall, Cinema, Where happy Tom Parker or Chaplin would grin him a Further defiance of consequence here. Song 3 - A Piper (Seumas O’Sullivan, 1879-1958) A piper in the streets today Set up, and tuned, and started to play, And away, away, away on the tide Of his music we started; on every side Doors and windows were opened wide, And women with petticoats coloured like flame, And little bare feet that were blue with cold, Went dancing back to the age of gold. And all the world went gay, went gay, For half an hour in the street today. Dawn comes up on London, And night’s undone. Stars are routed And street lamps outed. Sodden great clouds begin sail again Like all-night anchored galleons to the main From careful shallows to the far withdrawn Wide outer seas of sky. Support London Song Festival Only the poet strolls about at ease, Wondering what mortal thing his soul may please, And spitting at the drains, while Paul’s as ever Is mighty and a king of sky and river. But however good life was in London, he was dreaming of being back in his beloved Gloucestershire. Song 4 - Dinny Hill (F W Harvey, 1888-1957) Transcribed and edited by Philip Lancaster 2020 On Dinny Hill the daffodil Has crowned the year’s returning, The water cool in Placket Pool Is ruffled up and burning In little waves of fluttering fire; And all the heart of my desire Is now to be this day in Gloucestershire. Song 5 - Walking Song (F W Harvey) O Cranham ways are steep and green, And Cranham ways are high, And if I was that black rook It’s there that I would fly. But since I’m here in London town, A silly walking man; I’ll make this song and caw it As loudly as I can. He escaped from London as often as he could to go walking on the Gloucestershire hills. There was a boy, his earlier sins were past, Walked all one March into a joy at last, Music waking in him, Music outwelling From the good soil, That Western land, fulfilling All hopes of the mind, all spirit’s deep desire. A new spirit moved him. Nature was guide, All things were nothing to the waking-eyed Spirit that desired fame out of good work. Night walking, clear thinking, and little shirk Of what was needed for tasks. Time went, and still Grew on his making-passion and strong will Support London Song Festival To work his best. Song 6 - Love shakes my soul (Bliss Carman, 1861-1929) Love shakes my soul, like a mountain wind Falling upon the trees, When they are swayed and shaken and whitened and bowed As the great gusts will. I know why Daphne sped through the grove When the bright god came by, And shut herself in the laurel’s heart for her silent doom. Love fills my heart, like my lover’s breath Filling the hollow flute, Till the magic wood awakes and cries With remembrance and joy. Ah, timid syrinx, do I not know Thy tremor of sweet fear? For a beautiful and imperious player Is the Lord of Life. The miles go sliding by Under my steady feet, That mark a leisurely And still unbroken beat, Through coppices that hear Awhile, then lie as still As though no traveller Ever had climbed their hill. My comrades are the small Or dumb or singing birds, Squirrels, field things all And placid drowsing herds. Companions that I must Greet for a while, then leave Scattering the forward dust From dawn to late of eve. Support London Song Festival Song 7 – Nocturne (Vivian Locke-Ellis, 1878-1950) Transcribed and edited by Philip Lancaster 2020 When sets the sun on yonder hill His white clouds slowly follow him; Hours have they to linger still. Mountain-pastured, cool and dim. When at last the folded sky Waiting dumbly for the stars, Lets the wool-winged phantom fly, Lures the great owl from his bars. Then the little grass-lamp glows, And the blackest snails untwine; And the cautious hedgehog goes Under the light-uddered kine. But the tribes of haunted night, Omened bird and bat and toad, They must out of sound and sight Where shepherd takes the road; His white flocks are on the hill, Hours they have to wait for him, While the wool-winged bat is still, And the great owl’s eyelids dim I am that happy man that searches The ages for a lovely thing. …the hot scent that Is given from hedges, solitary flowers, not In mass, but lonely odours that scarcely float. But the incense bearers, soakers of the sun’s full Powerfulness, give out floods unchecked, wonderful Utterance almost, which makes no poet grateful, Since his love is for single things rarely found, Or hardly. Violets blooming in remote ground, One colour, one fragrance, like one un-companied sound Struck upon silence, nothing looked for, hung As from gold wires; this May incense is swung Heavy of odour the drenched meadows among. Song 8 – Scents (Edward Thomas, 1878-1917) Today I think only of scents, Scents dead leaves yield; Support London Song Festival Bracken, wild carrot seed And the square mustard field. Odours that rise when the spade Wounds the root of tree, Rose, current, raspberry, gout-weed, Rhubarb, celery. The smoke’s smell too Blowing from where the bonfire burns the waste The dead, the dangerous, and all to sweetness turns. It is enough to smell, to crumble the dark earth While the Robin sings over again Sad songs of Autumn mirth. What things I have missed today, I know very well But the seeing of them each new time is miracle, Nothing between Bredon and Dursley has Any day yesterday’s precise unpraised grace. The changed light, or curve changed mistily Coppice now bold cut; yesterday’s mystery. A sense of mornings, once seen, for ever gone, Its own for ever; alive, dead, my possession. Song 9 - Bright Clouds (Edward Thomas) Bright clouds of may Shade half the pond. Beyond, All but one bay Of emerald Tall reeds Like criss-cross bayonets Where a bird once called, Lies bright as the sun.