Tuesday Tones

In keeping with National Poetry Month, here is one of my favorite poems: “The Splendour Falls” by Alfred Lord Tennyson, who also happens to be my favorite poet.

The splendor falls on castle walls
   And snowy summits old in story;
The long light shakes across the lakes,
   And the wild cataract leaps in glory.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O, hark, O, hear! how thin and clear,
   And thinner, clearer, farther going!
O, sweet and far from cliff and scar
   The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!
Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying,
Blow, bugles; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O love, they die in yon rich sky,
   They faint on hill or field or river;
Our echoes roll from soul to soul,
   And grow forever and forever.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying.

I don’t remember not loving that poem. And here it is, set for chorus by Frederick Delius. I love the way the setting captures the repeated “dying, dying, dying….” with falling chords and delayed resolution.

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