(Sir) Arnold Edward
Trevor Bax

(1883 - 1953)

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The Lieder of Sir A. E. T. Bax

1. "A lullaby"

Text by Sheila MacCarthy
Music by Sir Arnold Bax

Sleep my baby, hush, my darling,
Golden stars drift all about your bed;
And while the soft grey veils of sleep
Over your little helpless body creep
Mine arms shall fold you Close,
and hold you Bathed in the dews
of the spirit's fountain head.
From your sleepy world of stars and dreams
Stretch our your tiny hands rememb'ring me.
Through pallid mists and memories
My sweet dead stars fall in the sighing seas.
You have I only, I that am lonely,
O give me love as I give love to thee!

2. "Far in a western brookland"

Text by Alfred Edward Housman (1859-1936), from A Shropshire Lad.
Music by Sir Arnold Bax

See also:

Ivor Gurney (1890-1937), from Ludlow and Teme, no. 2
Ernest John Moeran (1894-1950)
Freda Swain (b. 1902)

Far in a western brookland
That bred me long ago
The poplars stand and tremble
By pools I used to know.
 
There, in the windless night-time,
The wanderer, marvelling why,
Halts on the bridge to hearken
How soft the poplars sigh.
 
He hears: no more remembered
In fields where I was known,
Here I lie down in London
And turn to rest alone.
 
There, by the starlit fences,
The wanderer halts and hears
My soul that lingers sighing
About the glimmering weirs.

3. "Frühlingsregen"

Text by Friedrich Rückert (1788-1866)
Music by Sir Arnold Bax, set in German

Steig hernieder, Frühlingsregen
Löse die Gefangenschaft.
Der Natur die still entgegen
Dir sich Sehnt aus ihrer Haft
Brich die stärken Eisesketten
Die um uns der Winter Schlug
Schwelle Ström in ihren Betten
Und der Nymphe füllden Krug.
Säusle milder, rausche starker
Gold'ner! brich das eh'rne Schloss
Danaë ist hier im Kerker
Steig herab in ihren Schloss.

4. "Golden Guendolen"

Text by William Morris (1834-1896), a Pre-Raphaelite Song
Music by Sir Arnold Bax (1905)

Twixt the sunlight and the shade
Float up memories of my maid
God remember Guendolen.
Gold or gems she did not wear
But her yellow rippled hair
Like a veil, hid Guendolen.
Twixt the sunlight and the shade
My rough hands so strangely made
Folded Golden Guendolen.
Hands used to grip the sword hit hard
Framed her face, while on the sward
Tears fell down from Guendolen.
Guendolen now speaks no word
Hands fold round about the sword
Now no more of Guendolen.
Only 'twixt the light and shade
Floating memories of my maid
Make me pray for Guendolen.

5. "In the morning"

Text by Alfred Edward Housman (1859-1936), from Last Poems
Music by Sir Arnold Bax, from Along the Field, no. 4

In the morning, in the morning,
In the happy field of hay,
Oh they looked at one another
By the light of day.
 
In the blue and silver morning
On the haycock as they lay,
Oh they looked at one another
And they looked away.

6. "Magnificat"

Text from the Bible, St. Luke's Gospel, after a picture by D. G. Rosetti
Music by Sir Arnold Bax

My soul doth magnify the Lord and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour
For He hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden
For behold from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed
For He that is mighty hath done to me great things
and Holy is His Name
And His mercy is on them that fear Him from generation to generation.
He hath showed strength with His arm,
He hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts
He hath put down the mighty from their seats
And exalted them of low degree
He hath filled the hungry with good things
And the rich He hath sent Empty away.
he hath holpen his servant Israel in remembrance of His mercy,
As he promised to our fathers to Abraham and to his seed forever.

7. "The fairies"

Text by William Allingham (1824-1889)
Music by Sir Arnold Bax, 1908

Up the aery mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We daren't go ahunting
for fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, Red cap
And white owl's feather.
Down along the rocky shore
Some make their home,
They live on crispy pancakes,
Of yellow tide foam;
Some in the reeds
Of the black mountain lake,
With frogs for their watchdogs,
all night awake.
High on the hilltop the old king sits;
He is now so old and grey
He's nigh lost his wits
With a bridge of white mist...
Columkille he crosses
On his stately journies
From Slieve
League to Rosses.
Or going up with music
On cold starry nights,
To sup with the queen
Of the gay Northern Lights.
They stole little Bridget
for seven years long,
And when she came down again
Her friends were all gone.
They took her lightly back,
Between the night and morrow,
They thought she was fast asleep,
But she was dead from sorrow.
They have kept her ever since
Deep within a lake,
On a bed of flag leaves,
Watching till she wake...
By the craggy hillside,
Through the mosses bare,
They have planted thorntrees,
For pleasure here and there.
Is any man so daring,
As dig them up in spite,
He shall find their sharpest thorns
In his bed at night.

8. "The song in the twilight"

Text by Freda Bax
Music by Sir Arnold Bax, 1905

I have heard a music,
Strange and wild and tender,
Through the mystic splendour,
of the twilight stealing
Like the spell entracing of a magic potion
Slowly it enwound me,
Twirling, twining, dancing,
In a mazy motion,
Whirling all around me
Thro' the deep'ning twilight
Aery voices calling
And dim shadows falling
Clustered all around me
But I heeded only
That wild music burning
With an infinite yearning
all the heart of me
And I wandered lonely
Lonely, ah so lonely,
Down the pathway weeping
While the world lay sleeping
Dreaming at my feet.

9. "When I was one-and-twenty"

Text by Alfred Edward Housman (1859-1936), from A Shropshire Lad.
Music by Sir Arnold Bax

See also:

George Butterworth (1885-1916), from Six Songs from A Shropshire Lad, no. 2 (1911)
Henry Balfour Gardiner (1877-1950)
Armstrong Gibbs (1889-1960)
Ivor Gurney (1890-1937), from Ludlow and Teme, no. 6.
Mervyn, Lord Horder, the Second Baron of Ashford (1910-1996)
John Jeffreys (b. 1927)
Charles Wilfred Orr (1893-1976)
Sir Arthur Somervell (1863-1937), from A Shropshire Lad, no. 2.
Douglas Steele (b. 1910)

When I was one-and-twenty
I heard a wise man say,
"Give crowns and pounds and guineas
But not your heart away;
Give pearls away and rubies
But keep your fancy free."
But I was one-and-twenty,
No use to talk to me.
When I was one-and-twenty
I heard him say again,
"The heart out of the bosom
Was never given in vain;
'Tis paid with sighs a plenty
And sold for endless rue."
And I am two-and-twenty,
And oh, 'tis true, 'tis true.

10. "When we are lost"

Text by Dermot O'Byrne (1883-1953)
Music by Sir Arnold Bax

When we are lost
Within the dust and sand of desert years,
Who then shall count the cost
of two lives chained at Destiny's command,
When we are lost.
The shadow of fear
Our winding path has crossed
The cloudy waves surge onward to the land.
Time's thundering storms sweep down with ice and frost,
To chill the songs of love.
That we must follow shadows and be tossed
Hither and thither by Fate's relentless hand.
When we are lost, when we are lost.

11. "Youth"

Text by Clifford Bax (1886-1962)
Music by Sir Arnold Bax

Within a primrose wood I lay content
Upon a certain blithe blue day of spring,
And ever near, my lover came or went
And gathering violets ever did she sing
So fair she was I laughed for love,
and cried "Still can I see how yesterday you stood,
Your whole fair frame rejoicing in its pride
And lovelier than the whole spring-lovely wood!"
Ah then she paused, and coming where I sat
Smiled, and with one dear hand upon my head
"O Love, my love, may you remember that
When I am no more beautiful," she said.