http://discourse.textkit.com/t/sappho-fragment-1/18429/1
Rather than adding to Sean’s Sappho thread I thought it best to start a new thread to reply to his remark quoted above.
Henry Lawes 1595-1662 set two poems in Greek from what we now call the Anacreontea and each of these settings was followed by an “english’d” version with different music. There are apparently “no other settings of Ancient Greek in the 17th-century repertoire”. (Anthony Rooley, the theorbo player, see below).
Lawes set “λέγουσιν αἱ γυναῖκες” (7) and θέλω λέγειν Ἀτρείδας (23) which when “english’d” become “Away, away Anacreon” and Anacreon’s Ode, call’d the Lute".
The Greek texts are as follows:
λέγουσιν αἱ γυναῖκες·
‘Ἀνάκρεον, γέρων εἶ·
λαβὼν ἔσοπτρον ἄθρει
κόμας μὲν οὐκέτ᾿ οὔσας,
ψιλὸν δέ σευ μέτωπον.’
ἐγὼ δὲ τὰς κόμας μέν,
εἴτ᾿ εἰσὶν εἴτ᾿ ἀπῆλθον,
οὐκ οἶδα· τοῦτο δ᾿ οἶδα,
ὡς τῷ γέροντι μᾶλλον
1πρέπει τὸ τερπνὰ παίζειν,
ὅσῳ πέλας τὰ Μοίρης.
titulus: ἄλλο εἰς ἑαυτόν
θέλω λέγειν Ἀτρείδας,
θέλω δὲ Κάδμον ᾄδειν,
ἁ βάρβιτος δὲ χορδαῖς
Ἔρωτα μοῦνον ἠχεῖ.
ἤμειψα νεῦρα πρώην
καὶ τὴν λύρην ἅπασαν·
κἀγὼ μὲν ᾖδον ἄθλους
Ἡρακλέους· λύρη δὲ
Ἔρωτας ἀντεφώνει.
χαίροιτε λοιπὸν ἡμῖν,
ἥρωες· ἡ λύρη γὰρ
μόνους Ἔρωτας ᾄδει.
titulus: εἰς κιθάραν τοῦ αὐτοῦ The English poet, according to the editions I have found, of both poems is Mr John Berkenhead. The English text is:
The musical versions are:
(Note that the title is in Greek at the top of the page but the Greek text of the song is transliterated. I wonder whether that was to facilitate singing by those who didnt know Greek or whether Lawes himself didnt know Greek or whether it was simply a printing problem.)
(Here both the title " Τῶν 'ΑΝΑΚΡΈΟΝΤΟΣ ἐις Λύραι.ά. (?) and the text are printed in Greek so that rather sinks the explanations about the first song. )
“λέγουσιν αἱ γυναῖκες” comes from the second book published in 1655 and “θέλω λέγειν Ἀτρείδας” from the first published in 1653. According to Rooley they appeared in only one edition of Ayres and Dialogues. (He seems to think that both Greek poems come from the Second Book but whilst “λέγουσιν αἱ γυναῖκες” does, “θέλω λέγειν Ἀτρείδας” comes from the first book. But what is significant is that these Greek poems and their translations were dropped from subsequent editions. A sign that interest in Anacreon waned in the last half of the 17th century? See Budelmann below)
Here are the title pages from the first and second books for no good reason other than they contain a picture of Lawes.
As you will see by comparing the Greek settings with the “english’d” settings (below) the former are more elaborate and in a completely different style. The latter are much more in the contemporary style familiar to Lawes. The Greek versions seem a conscious effort at creating some imagined idea of Ancient Greek practice, or possibly simply an attempt at distancing. It seems probable that Lawes didn’t distinguish between the Anacreontea and Anacreon. Budelmann says
"The earlier Anacreontea were created in periods in which Anacreon’s own poetry was still reasonably well known, and there is some indication that Anacreon and the Anacreontea were sometimes considered part of the same phenomenon. In the second century CE Aulus Gellius (19.9) describes the performance of several pieces which he refers to as Ἀνακρεόντεια (‘poems of Anacreon’ or ‘Anacreontic poems’) and ‘verses by the old Anacreon’, and he also speaks of ‘Anacreon and other poets of that genre’. The lines he quotes are a version of what we know as Anacreontea 4. Clearly, the Anacreontea were thought to continue the tradition of Anacreon’s poetry, so much so that most of the Anacreontea poets are now anonymous. What survives may well be only a glimpse of a wider literary phenomenon, and the survival of some poems in multiple versions (such as Gellius’ quotation and Anacreontea 4) suggests that this was a genre that, at least in some contexts, permitted a degree of continuous variation and adaptation. Anacreon’s own poetry, I suggested above, went some way towards constituting a recognisable and easily transportable genre. This project is taken to a new level in the Anacreontea.
Such was the success of the Anacreontea that over time they came close to displacing Anacreon’s own poetry. The fascination with Anacreon from the Renaissance till the eighteenth century was a fascination, in the first place, with the – much better preserved – Anacreontea. Only the classical philology of the nineteenth century separated Anacreon and the Anacreontea, thus focusing attention back on Anacreon. This separation is right and proper, but it should not detract from the achievement of the Anacreontea, a body of poetry that is attractive in its own right and interesting as a rare example of a poetic tradition created around a long-dead poet. As such it testifies also to the qualities of Anacreon’s own work."
p 238-9 “Anacreon and the Anacreontea” in The Cambridge companion to Greek lyric edited by Felix Budelmann, Cambridge 2009.
For completeness and to facilitate a comparison with the Greek versions here are the “english’d” musical texts.
Note that “the Lute” is set for Bass alone, whilst the other settings use the soprano clef without specifying a voice and include a theorbo accompaniment.
Emma Kirkby recorded a disc with the theorbo player Anthony Rooley (to whom I have referred above) called “Classical Kirkby” which includes these songs and others of a similar period ( Boyce is the latest (1711-1779) most are 17th century). Emma Kirkby read classics at Oxford and before becoming a singer was a Classics school teacher. She was invited to be the president of the Classical Association in 1999–2000 and decided to give a recital instead of the customary inaugural lecture. This was the the genesis of the recording. You can listen to it on YouTube here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGLd6eCptx0&list=OLAK5uy_kf5-61eTXvhQ2nOYV2vHwxI5Sek13kHDY but it is a disk well worth getting. On a personal note I met Emma Kirkby at a party given by a musician friend some years ago and she talked very engagingly about the different pronunciations she had tried out and the difficulty “experts” had in telling the difference. She says in the sleeve note that grateful as she was for suggestions made by the CA audiences she ultimately made an “unscholarly choice” of using “what seemed to be the most normal current pronunciation in schools and colleges in the UK, whether or not that comes closest either to 17th-century or indeed Classical period norms.”
With apologies for the length of this post I want to mention one of my favourite Schubert discs “Schubert & the Classics” volume 14 of the Hyperion complete edition. (https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDJ33014 with some fine notes about Schubert’s education and engagement with Classics). The sight of the oil refineries at Eleusis years ago and the Schiller’s “Schöne Welt, wo bist du? Kehre wieder” are a very strong memory. (There is a fine version by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YrUpSdSuGwk)
But to come back to Anacreon this poem by Goethe set by Wolf seems a fitting place to end.
Wo die Rose hier blüht,
wo Reben um Lorbeer sich schlingen,
wo das Turtelchen lockt,
wo sich das Grillchen ergötzt,
welch ein Grab ist hier,
das alle Götter mit Leben schön
bepflanzt und geziert?
Es ist Anakreons Ruh.
Frühling, Sommer und Herbst genoß
der glückliche Dichter;
vor dem Winter hat ihn endlich
der Hügel geschützt.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)
Here, where the rose blooms,
where vine and laurel entwine,
where the turtle-dove calls its mate,
where the cicada sings for joy,
whose grave is this,
so beautifully planted and adorned
with life by all the gods?
It is Anacreon’s resting-place.
Spring, summer and autumn were enjoyed
by the happy poet;
and at last this mound has sheltered him
from the winter.Sung here by the late and great Christa Ludwig.
