Notes and Translations
Faculty Recital
Lloyd Linney, Soprano
Michael Rickman, Piano
Franz Joseph Haydn, Austrian by birth, made extensive visits to London twice during
the later part of his life. During his second visit, the widowed Anne Hunter whom he had met
earlier presented Haydn with several of her poems. Haydn used some of these in a collection of
songs for voice and piano, English Cansonettas, composed in 1794. Hunter's poetry is not
outstanding and, possibly due to Haydn's weak skills with the English language, the
relationship between poetry and music is not strong. However, these songs mark a turning
point in solo vocal literature in that Haydn used three staves for the compositions so that the
vocal line is more independent and is not merely doubled in the right hand of the piano as in
earlier songs. In "She Never Told Her Love", the piano part almost overshadows
Shakespeare's text from Twelfth Night in which Viola, disguised as a boy, declares her love for
the Duke.
Fidelity
(poem by Anne Hunter)
While hollow burst the rushing winds and
heavy beats the show'r,
This anxious aching bosom finds no comfort
in its pow'r.
For ah! my love it little knows what thy hard
fate may be,
What bitter storm of fortune blows,
what tempests trouble thee.
A wayward fate hath spun the thread,
on which our days depend,
And darkling in the chekerd shade she draws
it to an end.
But what so e're may be our doom,
the lot is cast for me;
For in the world or in the tomb my heart is
fixed on thee.
She Never Told Her Love
(text by William Shakespeare)
She never told her love, but let concealment,
like a worm in the bud,
feed on her damask cheek!
She sat, like Patience on a monument,
smiling at grief.
Piercing Eyes
(poem by Anne Hunter)
Why asks my fair one if I love
those eyes so piercing bright!
Can ev'ry doubt of that remove
and need no other light.
Those eyes full well do know my heart
and all its workings see.
E're since they play'd the conq'ror's part,
and I no more was free.
O Tuneful Voice
(poem by Anne Hunter)
O tuneful voice, I still deplore
thy accents which I hear no more,
still vibrate on my heart!
In Echo's cave I long to dwell
and still to hear that sad farewell,
when we were forced to part!
Bright eyes! O that the task were mine,
to guard the liquid fires, that shine
and round your orbits play,
to watch them with a vestal's care!
To feed with smiles a light so fair,
that it may ne'er decay.
