~~~~~Composer biography~~~~~ Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912) was an Afro-British composer who wrote in a tonal, Romantic style. His output includes 82 published opuses, comprising chamber works; cantatas; orchestral works; songs; a violin concerto; and works for violin and piano, as well as solo piano. Coleridge-Taylor's father, Daniel Taylor, was a doctor from Sierra Leone; his ancestors were enslaved people in the Thirteen Colonies whom the British freed and repatriated to Africa. His mother, Alice Hare Martin, was a white Englishwoman. As the elder Taylor left England without knowing he had a son, Coleridge-Taylor grew up with his mother and her family in Croydon, just south of London. He started learning the violin from his grandfather on a small fiddle they had at home. Later, he took lessons from a local musician named Joseph Beckwith, and sang in choirs with a much-praised boy soprano voice. At the age of 15, Coleridge-Taylor entered the Royal College of Music as a violin student, with a minor in piano. Soon he switched his primary focus to composition, having had some music published already. His composition teacher was Charles Villiers Stanford, who also taught Gustav Holst, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and a host of other notable English composers. Coleridge-Taylor met with considerable success, having been recognized by some of England’s most eminent composers. In 1898, the Three Choirs Festival wrote to the composer Edward Elgar to commission an orchestral work. Elgar declined the offer, but recommended that Coleridge-Taylor take up the offer, saying that he was "far away the cleverest fellow going amongst the young men [composers in England]." Coleridge-Taylor accepted it and composed his Ballade for Orchestra, op. 33. That same year, he completed what would become his most famous work, the spirited cantata Hiawatha's Wedding Feast, with text from Longfellow's epic poem “The Song of Hiawatha." The premiere was attended by another famous composer - Sir Arthur Sullivan, who wrote in his diary, "Much impressed by the lad's genius. He [Coleridge-Taylor] is a composer, not a music-maker." Around then, Coleridge-Taylor also began to write music influenced by his African identity. He corresponded with African-Americans in the United States, including members of the Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Society, a choral society named after him in Washington, D.C. W.E.B. DuBois, the famous writer on African-American social issues and civil rights, commended him as well. Coleridge-Taylor toured the United States twice and met President Theodore Roosevelt at the White House - a rare honor, especially given the deep divide between Black and White Americans. Back in England, Coleridge-Taylor’s works would be performed in some of the country’s grandest venues, including the Queen's Hall and Royal Albert Hall. He continued to compose prolifically for various combinations of instruments, including piano solo (e.g. his 24 Negro Melodies op. 59, which are settings of African songs and African-American spirituals); full orchestra (e.g. his Symphonic Variations on an African Theme [the spiritual “I’m Troubled in Mind"] op. 63); and SATB chorus (e.g. his part-song Summer Is Gone, published in 1910 without opus number). Rather unjustly, Coleridge-Taylor's renown and prolific output did not grant him financial stability. He did not receive royalties for many of his works, including Hiawatha's Wedding Feast, which would have yielded a considerable fortune. A main source of income came from his post as conductor of the Croydon Conservatoire's orchestra. He also traveled throughout England as a conductor and judge at music festivals. Coleridge-Taylor found little time for rest, and he died at the age of 37 from pneumonia, not long after he revised his thoroughly striking Violin Concerto. With his wife, fellow RCM graduate Jessie Walmisley, Coleridge-Taylor had two children: a son Hiawatha and a daughter Gwendolen (who later went by Avril). Both children had distinguished musical careers of their own; Hiawatha was a conductor, and Avril was a composer as well as conductor. Despite the stresses of his career, Coleridge-Taylor said the following about his life: "I have been very happy in my surroundings all my life, first in my mother and then in my marriage. Even without any moderate success, I think I should have been one of those rare beings - a happy man." ~~~~~Program notes~~~~~ Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Six Sorrow Songs were composed in 1904, just before his first tour of the United States in October that same year. While a direct connection has not been documented, the title “Sorrow Songs” echoes the title of an essay by W.E.B. Du Bois from The Souls of Black Folk, which, according to his friend and biographer W. C. Berwick Sayers, Coleridge-Taylor called “the greatest book he had ever read.” In the book’s final essay, “Of the Sorrow Songs,” Du Bois discusses the songs (or spirituals) sung by enslaved Africans in the United States. Du Bois writes that the sorrow songs are "the music of an unhappy people, of the children of disappointment; they tell of death and suffering and unvoiced longing toward a truer world, of misty wanderings and hidden ways.” The essay deserves to be read in full and can be found here: www.gutenberg.org/files/408/408-h/408-h.htm#chap14 For the Six Sorrow Songs, Coleridge-Taylor set poems by the English poet Christina Rossetti (1830-1894). The poems Coleridge-Taylor selected are all on melancholic, mournful themes, including longing, unrequited love, death, and grief, in keeping with the context of the title. With the exception of the final two poems, all of Rosetti’s poems were originally given the title “Song.” Below are timestamps and brief descriptions of each song; for a more in-depth look at the Sorrow Songs, we recommend musicologist Saeideh Rajabzadeh’s thesis “Haply I may remember, And haply may forget”: The Doubled Nature of Intertextual Genre Relationships in Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Six Sorrow Songs, Op. 57.” 0:10 - The first of the Sorrow Songs, “Oh, What Comes Over the Sea” is in E minor, with a stormy character, defined by a chromatic, declamatory vocal line and thunder-like tremolandi in the piano accompaniment. The desperation evoked in Coleridge-Taylor’s music aligns with Rossetti’s subject matter: the speaker waiting for someone or something “over the sea,” yet “nothing comes home to me.” 1:45 - “When I Am Dead, My Dearest,” in G major, is slow and calm, with a melodic, elegiac quality to both the vocal and piano parts. The song features a brief modulation to B minor in the first half of each stanza, before returning to the home key of G major. 4:03 - “O Roses for the Flush of Youth,” in F minor, begins with a warbling piano solo, punctuated by foreboding open fifths in the left hand. (Rajabzadeh, citing extensive scholarship, likens these open fifths to drum calls, or drum-like motifs, heard in African-American spirituals.) The vocal part features brief melismas that create a sighing effect, in line with the mournful text. 6:44 - “She Sat And Sang Alway” begins with a lilting, lullaby-like piano introduction in A major. Here, the vocal part is much more melismatic, while the character is initially peaceful and pastoral; however, by the second stanza (“I sat and wept alway…”), the music modulates to the parallel minor, corresponding with the darker subject matter. A short, haunting postlude - the same material as the introduction, but in minor - closes out the song, perhaps allowing listeners to contemplate the poem’s last line (“Her songs died on the air”). 8:59 - “Unmindful of the Roses,” in C-sharp minor, begins with a chordal piano introduction whose descending material is repeated throughout the song. The vocal part builds in intensity to the final line of each stanza, which ends in the relative key of E major. Rossetti’s poem was originally titled “One Sea-Side Grave.” 11:05 - “Too Late for Love” is set to stanzas 1, 2, and 6 of Rosetti’s epic poem “The Prince’s Progress.” The song begins forcefully, with its four opening outbursts (“Too late for love, too late for joy, too late, too late!”) clearly defined in the vocal part. The piano takes more of a soloistic role in this song than in the other Sorrow Songs: it “answers” each line of text with a lyrical accompaniment and bridges each stanza with a series of arpeggiated chords. In the second half of the song (beginning with “You should have wept yesterday…), Coleridge-Taylor introduces a new motif in the piano, supported by ominous, repeated open fifths in the left hand, again (according to Rajabzadeh) reminiscent of drums. The rhythm of this motif figures prominently in the vocal part, as well as the ensuing piano accompaniment. The song ends with a soft, plaintive phrase on the words “You should have wept her yesterday,” followed by two minor chords in the piano part.
~~~~~Text of the songs~~~~~ 1. Oh what comes over the sea, Shoals and quicksands past; And what comes home to me, Sailing slow, sailing fast? A wind comes over the sea With a moan in its blast; But nothing comes home to me, Sailing slow, sailing fast. Let me be, let me be, For my lot is cast: Land or sea all's one to me, And sail it slow or fast. 2. When I am dead, my dearest, Sing no sad songs for me; Plant thou no roses at my head, Nor shady cypress-tree: Be the green grass above me With showers and dewdrops wet; And if thou wilt, remember, And if thou wilt, forget. I shall not see the shadows, I shall not feel the rain; I shall not hear the nightingale Sing on, as if in pain: And dreaming through the twilight That doth not rise nor set, Haply I may remember, And haply may forget. 3. O roses for the flush of youth, And laurel for the perfect prime; But pluck an ivy branch for me Grown old before my time. O violets for the grave of youth, And bay for those dead in their prime; Give me the withered leaves I chose Before in the old time. 4. She sat and sang alway By the green margin of a stream, Watching the fishes leap and play Beneath the glad sunbeam. I sat and wept alway Beneath the moon's most shadowy beam, Watching the blossoms of the May Weep leaves into the stream. I wept for memory; She sang for hope that is so fair: My tears were swallowed by the sea; Her songs died on the air. 5. Unmindful of the roses, Unmindful of the thorn, A reaper tired reposes Among his gathered corn: So might I, till the morn! Cold as the cold Decembers, Past as the days that set, While only one remembers And all the rest forget,-- But one remembers yet. 6. "Too late for love, too late for joy, Too late, too late! You loitered on the road too long, You trifled at the gate: The enchanted dove upon her branch Died without a mate; The enchanted princess in her tower Slept, died, behind the grate; Her heart was starving all this while You made it wait. "Ten years ago, five years ago, One year ago, Even then you had arrived in time, Though somewhat slow; Then you had known her living face Which now you cannot know: The frozen fountain would have leaped, The buds gone on to blow, The warm south wind would have awaked To melt the snow. "You should have wept her yesterday, Wasting upon her bed: But wherefore should you weep to-day That she is dead? Lo, we who love weep not to-day, But crown her royal head. Let be these poppies that we strew, Your roses are too red: Let be these poppies, not for you Cut down and spread."
A beautiful analysis of the melodic framework that is presented in this beautiful assortment of songs. I'd love to hear your analysis on the original keys which were lower.
@@deadwalke9588 Thank you so much for the comment! I wasn't aware that the original keys were lower, although IMSLP has a score marked "low voice" that has all the songs a semitone lower. I believe the lower keys would do just as well to provide a certain depth, gravity, and indeed, sorrow to these songs.
~~~~~Composer biography~~~~~
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912) was an Afro-British composer who wrote in a tonal, Romantic style. His output includes 82 published opuses, comprising chamber works; cantatas; orchestral works; songs; a violin concerto; and works for violin and piano, as well as solo piano.
Coleridge-Taylor's father, Daniel Taylor, was a doctor from Sierra Leone; his ancestors were enslaved people in the Thirteen Colonies whom the British freed and repatriated to Africa. His mother, Alice Hare Martin, was a white Englishwoman. As the elder Taylor left England without knowing he had a son, Coleridge-Taylor grew up with his mother and her family in Croydon, just south of London. He started learning the violin from his grandfather on a small fiddle they had at home. Later, he took lessons from a local musician named Joseph Beckwith, and sang in choirs with a much-praised boy soprano voice. At the age of 15, Coleridge-Taylor entered the Royal College of Music as a violin student, with a minor in piano. Soon he switched his primary focus to composition, having had some music published already. His composition teacher was Charles Villiers Stanford, who also taught Gustav Holst, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and a host of other notable English composers.
Coleridge-Taylor met with considerable success, having been recognized by some of England’s most eminent composers. In 1898, the Three Choirs Festival wrote to the composer Edward Elgar to commission an orchestral work. Elgar declined the offer, but recommended that Coleridge-Taylor take up the offer, saying that he was "far away the cleverest fellow going amongst the young men [composers in England]." Coleridge-Taylor accepted it and composed his Ballade for Orchestra, op. 33. That same year, he completed what would become his most famous work, the spirited cantata Hiawatha's Wedding Feast, with text from Longfellow's epic poem “The Song of Hiawatha." The premiere was attended by another famous composer - Sir Arthur Sullivan, who wrote in his diary, "Much impressed by the lad's genius. He [Coleridge-Taylor] is a composer, not a music-maker."
Around then, Coleridge-Taylor also began to write music influenced by his African identity. He corresponded with African-Americans in the United States, including members of the Samuel Coleridge-Taylor Society, a choral society named after him in Washington, D.C. W.E.B. DuBois, the famous writer on African-American social issues and civil rights, commended him as well. Coleridge-Taylor toured the United States twice and met President Theodore Roosevelt at the White House - a rare honor, especially given the deep divide between Black and White Americans. Back in England, Coleridge-Taylor’s works would be performed in some of the country’s grandest venues, including the Queen's Hall and Royal Albert Hall. He continued to compose prolifically for various combinations of instruments, including piano solo (e.g. his 24 Negro Melodies op. 59, which are settings of African songs and African-American spirituals); full orchestra (e.g. his Symphonic Variations on an African Theme [the spiritual “I’m Troubled in Mind"] op. 63); and SATB chorus (e.g. his part-song Summer Is Gone, published in 1910 without opus number).
Rather unjustly, Coleridge-Taylor's renown and prolific output did not grant him financial stability. He did not receive royalties for many of his works, including Hiawatha's Wedding Feast, which would have yielded a considerable fortune. A main source of income came from his post as conductor of the Croydon Conservatoire's orchestra. He also traveled throughout England as a conductor and judge at music festivals. Coleridge-Taylor found little time for rest, and he died at the age of 37 from pneumonia, not long after he revised his thoroughly striking Violin Concerto. With his wife, fellow RCM graduate Jessie Walmisley, Coleridge-Taylor had two children: a son Hiawatha and a daughter Gwendolen (who later went by Avril). Both children had distinguished musical careers of their own; Hiawatha was a conductor, and Avril was a composer as well as conductor.
Despite the stresses of his career, Coleridge-Taylor said the following about his life: "I have been very happy in my surroundings all my life, first in my mother and then in my marriage. Even without any moderate success, I think I should have been one of those rare beings - a happy man."
~~~~~Program notes~~~~~
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Six Sorrow Songs were composed in 1904, just before his first tour of the United States in October that same year.
While a direct connection has not been documented, the title “Sorrow Songs” echoes the title of an essay by W.E.B. Du Bois from The Souls of Black Folk, which, according to his friend and biographer W. C. Berwick Sayers, Coleridge-Taylor called “the greatest book he had ever read.” In the book’s final essay, “Of the Sorrow Songs,” Du Bois discusses the songs (or spirituals) sung by enslaved Africans in the United States. Du Bois writes that the sorrow songs are "the music of an unhappy people, of the children of disappointment; they tell of death and suffering and unvoiced longing toward a truer world, of misty wanderings and hidden ways.” The essay deserves to be read in full and can be found here: www.gutenberg.org/files/408/408-h/408-h.htm#chap14
For the Six Sorrow Songs, Coleridge-Taylor set poems by the English poet Christina Rossetti (1830-1894). The poems Coleridge-Taylor selected are all on melancholic, mournful themes, including longing, unrequited love, death, and grief, in keeping with the context of the title. With the exception of the final two poems, all of Rosetti’s poems were originally given the title “Song.”
Below are timestamps and brief descriptions of each song; for a more in-depth look at the Sorrow Songs, we recommend musicologist Saeideh Rajabzadeh’s thesis “Haply I may remember, And haply may forget”: The Doubled Nature of Intertextual Genre Relationships in Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Six Sorrow Songs, Op. 57.”
0:10 - The first of the Sorrow Songs, “Oh, What Comes Over the Sea” is in E minor, with a stormy character, defined by a chromatic, declamatory vocal line and thunder-like tremolandi in the piano accompaniment. The desperation evoked in Coleridge-Taylor’s music aligns with Rossetti’s subject matter: the speaker waiting for someone or something “over the sea,” yet “nothing comes home to me.”
1:45 - “When I Am Dead, My Dearest,” in G major, is slow and calm, with a melodic, elegiac quality to both the vocal and piano parts. The song features a brief modulation to B minor in the first half of each stanza, before returning to the home key of G major.
4:03 - “O Roses for the Flush of Youth,” in F minor, begins with a warbling piano solo, punctuated by foreboding open fifths in the left hand. (Rajabzadeh, citing extensive scholarship, likens these open fifths to drum calls, or drum-like motifs, heard in African-American spirituals.) The vocal part features brief melismas that create a sighing effect, in line with the mournful text.
6:44 - “She Sat And Sang Alway” begins with a lilting, lullaby-like piano introduction in A major. Here, the vocal part is much more melismatic, while the character is initially peaceful and pastoral; however, by the second stanza (“I sat and wept alway…”), the music modulates to the parallel minor, corresponding with the darker subject matter. A short, haunting postlude - the same material as the introduction, but in minor - closes out the song, perhaps allowing listeners to contemplate the poem’s last line (“Her songs died on the air”).
8:59 - “Unmindful of the Roses,” in C-sharp minor, begins with a chordal piano introduction whose descending material is repeated throughout the song. The vocal part builds in intensity to the final line of each stanza, which ends in the relative key of E major. Rossetti’s poem was originally titled “One Sea-Side Grave.”
11:05 - “Too Late for Love” is set to stanzas 1, 2, and 6 of Rosetti’s epic poem “The Prince’s Progress.”
The song begins forcefully, with its four opening outbursts (“Too late for love, too late for joy, too late, too late!”) clearly defined in the vocal part. The piano takes more of a soloistic role in this song than in the other Sorrow Songs: it “answers” each line of text with a lyrical accompaniment and bridges each stanza with a series of arpeggiated chords.
In the second half of the song (beginning with “You should have wept yesterday…), Coleridge-Taylor introduces a new motif in the piano, supported by ominous, repeated open fifths in the left hand, again (according to Rajabzadeh) reminiscent of drums. The rhythm of this motif figures prominently in the vocal part, as well as the ensuing piano accompaniment. The song ends with a soft, plaintive phrase on the words “You should have wept her yesterday,” followed by two minor chords in the piano part.
~~~~~Text of the songs~~~~~
1.
Oh what comes over the sea,
Shoals and quicksands past;
And what comes home to me,
Sailing slow, sailing fast?
A wind comes over the sea
With a moan in its blast;
But nothing comes home to me,
Sailing slow, sailing fast.
Let me be, let me be,
For my lot is cast:
Land or sea all's one to me,
And sail it slow or fast.
2.
When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress-tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.
I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through the twilight
That doth not rise nor set,
Haply I may remember,
And haply may forget.
3.
O roses for the flush of youth,
And laurel for the perfect prime;
But pluck an ivy branch for me
Grown old before my time.
O violets for the grave of youth,
And bay for those dead in their prime;
Give me the withered leaves I chose
Before in the old time.
4.
She sat and sang alway
By the green margin of a stream,
Watching the fishes leap and play
Beneath the glad sunbeam.
I sat and wept alway
Beneath the moon's most shadowy beam,
Watching the blossoms of the May
Weep leaves into the stream.
I wept for memory;
She sang for hope that is so fair:
My tears were swallowed by the sea;
Her songs died on the air.
5.
Unmindful of the roses,
Unmindful of the thorn,
A reaper tired reposes
Among his gathered corn:
So might I, till the morn!
Cold as the cold Decembers,
Past as the days that set,
While only one remembers
And all the rest forget,--
But one remembers yet.
6.
"Too late for love, too late for joy,
Too late, too late!
You loitered on the road too long,
You trifled at the gate:
The enchanted dove upon her branch
Died without a mate;
The enchanted princess in her tower
Slept, died, behind the grate;
Her heart was starving all this while
You made it wait.
"Ten years ago, five years ago,
One year ago,
Even then you had arrived in time,
Though somewhat slow;
Then you had known her living face
Which now you cannot know:
The frozen fountain would have leaped,
The buds gone on to blow,
The warm south wind would have awaked
To melt the snow.
"You should have wept her yesterday,
Wasting upon her bed:
But wherefore should you weep to-day
That she is dead?
Lo, we who love weep not to-day,
But crown her royal head.
Let be these poppies that we strew,
Your roses are too red:
Let be these poppies, not for you
Cut down and spread."
A beautiful analysis of the melodic framework that is presented in this beautiful assortment of songs. I'd love to hear your analysis on the original keys which were lower.
@@deadwalke9588 Thank you so much for the comment! I wasn't aware that the original keys were lower, although IMSLP has a score marked "low voice" that has all the songs a semitone lower. I believe the lower keys would do just as well to provide a certain depth, gravity, and indeed, sorrow to these songs.
No