The Standard Cantatas: Their Stories, Their Music, and Their Composers: A HandbookUpton, George P. (George Putnam)
History
The Standard Cantatas: Their Stories, Their Music, and Their Composers: A Handbook
Upton, George P. (George Putnam)
Cantatas -- History and criticism
The second part, a quartet and chorus, is pastoral in character, and
reflects the idyllic quiet and beauty of the text. The quartet, "The
Shepherds on the Lawn," is introduced by short tenor, bass, and alto
solos, and also contains a very melodious and graceful solo for soprano
("When such Music sweet their Hearts and Ears did greet"), after which
the full quartet leads up to a vigorous chorus ("The Air such Pleasure
loath to lose"), closing the part.
The third part is choral, and forms an effective climax to the work. It
opens with the powerful chorus, "Ring out, ye crystal Spheres,"
emphasized by the organ bass with stately effect, and moves on
majestically to the close,--
"And Heaven as at some festival
Will open wide the gates of her high palace hall."
The Realm of Fancy.
"The Realm of Fancy" is a short cantata, the music set to Keats's
familiar poem:--
"Ever let the fancy roam,
Pleasure never is at home:
At a touch sweet pleasure melteth,
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth."
With the exception of a dozen lines, the dainty poem is used entire, and
is set to music with a keen appreciation of its graceful beauty. A short
allegretto fancifully trips along to the opening chorus ("Ever let the
Fancy roam"), which is admirable for its shifting play of musical color.
A soprano solo ("She will bring in spite of Frost"), followed by a very
expressive barytone solo ("Thou shalt at a Glance behold the Daisy and
the Marigold"), leads up to a charming little chorus ("Shaded Hyacinth,
always Sapphire Queen"). A short instrumental passage, in the time of the
opening allegretto, introduces the final chorus ("O Sweet Fancy, let her
loose"), charmingly worked up, and closing in canon form. The cantata is
very short; but rarely have poem and music been more happily wedded than
in this delightful tribute to fancy.
Phoebus, Arise.
Mr. Paine's ripe scholarship is shown to admirable advantage in his
selection of the poem "Phoebus, Arise" from among the lyrics of the old
Scottish poet, William Drummond, of Hawthornden, and the characteristic
old-style setting he has given to it. Like "The Realm of Fancy," it is
very short; but like that cantata, also, it illustrates the versatility
of his talent and the happy manner in which he preserves the
characteristics of the poem in his music. Drummond, who has been called
"the Scottish Petrarch," and whose poems were so celebrated that even Ben
Jonson could find it in his way to visit him, was noted for the grace and
lightness of his verse, and the pensive cast with which it was tinged. It
has little of the modern poetic style, and the composer has clothed his
poem in a musical garb to correspond.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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