Four Shakespeare Songs

Song Cycle by Matthew Dewey (b. 1984)

1. Over hill, over dale [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

Over hill, over dale,
  Thorough bush, thorough briar,
Over park, over pale,
  Thorough flood, thorough fire
I do wander everywhere.

Swifter than the moon's sphere;
And I serve the fairy queen,
To dew her orbs upon the green.
The cowslips tall her pensioners be;
In their gold coats spots you see;
Those be rubies, fairy favours,
In those freckles live their savours:
I must go seek some dew-drops here,
And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.

Text Authorship:

by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, from A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act II, Scene 1.

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

FRE French (Français) (Guy Laffaille) , copyright © 2015, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
ITA Italian (Italiano) (Ferdinando Albeggiani) , "Per colline e per valli", copyright © 2008, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

2. Come unto these yellow sands [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

Come unto these yellow sands,
[Then]¹ take hands:
Curtsied when you have and kissed,
The wild waves [whist]²:
Foot it featly here and there;
And, sweet sprites, the [burthen]³ bear.

Hark, hark!
Bow-wow.
The watch dogs bark;
Bow-wow.
Hark, hark!
I hear the strain of strutting Chanticleer
Cry, Cock-a-diddle dow.

Text Authorship:

by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, appears in The Tempest, Act I, scene 2

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

ENG English (Andrea Maffei) , no title, first published 1869
FIN Finnish (Suomi) (Paavo Cajander)
FRE French (Français) (Guy de Pourtalès)
FRE French (Français) (François-Victor Hugo) , no title
FRE French (Français) (Maurice Bouchor)
SWE Swedish (Svenska) (Anonymous/Unidentified Artist)

View original text (without footnotes)
¹ Bacon, Beach, Quilter: "And then"
² Bacon: "shist"
³ Bacon: "burden"

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

3. Take, o take those lips away [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

Take, o take those lips away,
That so sweetly [were]¹ forsworn;
And those eyes, the break of day,
Lights [that]² do mislead the morn:
But my kisses bring again;
Seals of love, [but]³ seal'd in vain, sealed in vain.

Hide, o hide those hills of snow
that thy frozen bosom wears,
On whose tops the pinks that grow
are yet of those that April wears;
But first set my poor heart free,
Bound in those icy chains by thee.

Text Authorship:

by Anonymous / Unidentified Author
sometimes misattributed to William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

DUT Dutch (Nederlands) (L. A. J. Burgersdijk)
FIN Finnish (Suomi) (Paavo Cajander)
POL Polish (Polski) (Jan Kasprowicz) , "Śpiew Pacholęcia", Warsaw, first published 1907

View original text (without footnotes)
Note: quoted by John Fletcher, in Bloody Brother, 1639 and by William Shakespeare, in Measure for Measure, Act IV, scene 1, c1604 (just one stanza)
¹ Bishop: "are"
² Bishop: "which"
³ Bishop: "tho'"

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

4. Come away, Death [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English

[Come away, come away, death]¹,
  And in sad cypress let me be laid;
Fly away, fly away, breath;
  I am slain by a fair cruel maid.
My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,
  [O prepare it!]²
My part of death, no one so true
  Did share it.

Not a flower, not a flower sweet,
  On my black coffin let there be [strown]³;
Not a friend, not a friend greet
  My poor corpse, where my bones shall be [thrown]⁴:
[A thousand, thousand sighs to save,]⁵
  Lay me, O where
[Sad true]⁶ lover never find my grave,
  [To weep there!]⁷

Text Authorship:

by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, appears in Twelfth Night: or, What You Will, Act II, scene 4

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

FIN Finnish (Suomi) (Paavo Cajander)
POL Polish (Polski) (Józef Komierowski) , no title

View original text (without footnotes)
¹ Fortner: "Death, come away, come away"
² Dring: "Come prepare it"
³ Leguerney: "thrown"; Wilkinson: "strewn"
⁴ Leguerney: "strown"
⁵ Korngold: "A thousand sighs to save,"; omitted by Argento.
⁶ Korngold: "True"
⁷ Amram: "did share it." [mistake?]

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

Total word count: 319