The Mastersingers: "Flieder" Monologue [in English] Thomas Stewart (1980)

Lawrence Foster, Houston Symphony Orchestra
(Recorded 14th March, 1980, Jones Hall, Houston)
Hans Sachs - Thomas Stewart
The production was by Patrick Bakman. The stage designs and costumes were by Carl Toms. The English translation was by Frederick Jameson, with substantial revisions by Norman Feasey, Kate Pogue and Sterling Tinsley.
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The complete performance can be found here:
• Wagner: The Mastersing...
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The gentle breath of lilac,
how sweet, how soft it falls!
It whispers to my spirit,
"Friend, speak from your heart", it calls.
And yet, what can I say to him?
I would not know where to begin!
And if the task I can't handle,
poor friend, let me go free
to take up my leather and hammer
and let all this poetry be!
And yet, it comes again:
I hear its haunting refrain;
can't understand it, but cannot forget it,
so now I must try to comprehend it-
that song was a creation
beyond all comprehension it seems!
The rulebook can't be applied there,
and yet, no mistakes were there.
It was so old, and yet was so new-
the song of larks when spring awakes:
if one heard
that wondrous bird
and tried to sing the same,
he'd be disgraced and shamed!
Spring filled his heart,
his soul poured out
and filled the world with his song,
his singing from the heart;
and so I saw quite clearly
the poet stuck within him.
The lark I heard today
could not deny his heart from singing;
whatever Masters say,
he has the grace of one, Hans Sachs, then!
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"Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg" ("The Mastersingers of Nuremberg") is a comic opera in three acts by Richard Wagner, with a German libretto by the composer. It was first performed at the Royal Court and National Theatre in Munich on 21st June, 1868.