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Two Shakespeare Songs

Song Cycle by Alison Bauld (b. 1944)

1. Cry, cock‑a‑doodle‑doo  [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English 
ARIEL
Come unto these yellow sands,
And then take hands.
Curtsied when you have, and kissed
The wild waves whist.
Foot it featly here and there,
And, sweet sprites, bear
The burden. Hark, hark!

SPIRITS
Bow-wow.

ARIEL
The watchdogs bark.

Bow-wow.

Hark, hark! I hear
The strain of strutting chanticleer
Cry “Cock-a-diddle-dow.”

FERDINAND
Where should this music be? I' th' air or th' earth?
It sounds no more, and sure, it waits
Some god o' th' island. Sitting on a bank,
Weeping again the king my father’s wrack,
This music crept by me upon the waters,
Allaying both their fury and my passion
With its sweet air. There I have followed it,
Or it hath drawn me rather. But ’tis gone.
No, it begins again.

ARIEL
Full fathom five thy father lies.
Of his bones are coral made.
Those are pearls that were his eyes.
Nothing of him that doth fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell

SPIRITS
Ding-dong.

ARIEL
Hark, how I hear them.

SPIRITS
Ding-dong, bell.

Text Authorship:

  • by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)

Based on:

  • a text in English by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, appears in The Tempest, Act I, scene 2
    • Go to the text page.

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Researcher for this page: Joost van der Linden [Guest Editor]

2. The Witches' Song  [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English 
First Witch
    Thrice the brinded cat hath mew'd.

Second Witch
    Thrice and once the hedge-pig whined.

Third Witch
    Harpier cries 'Tis time, 'tis time.

First Witch
    Round about the cauldron go;
    In the poison'd entrails throw.
    Toad, that under cold stone
    Days and nights has thirty-one
    Swelter'd venom sleeping got,
    Boil thou first i' the charmed pot.

ALL
    Double, double toil and trouble;
    Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch
    Fillet of a fenny snake,
    In the cauldron boil and bake;
    Eye of newt and toe of frog,
    Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
    Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
    Lizard's leg and owlet's wing,
    For a charm of powerful trouble,
    Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

ALL
    Double, double toil and trouble;
    Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Third Witch
    Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
    Witches' mummy, maw and gulf
    Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark,
    Root of hemlock digg'd i' the dark,
    Liver of blaspheming Jew,
    Gall of goat, and slips of yew
    Silver'd in the moon's eclipse,
    Nose of Turk and Tartar's lips,
    Finger of birth-strangled babe
    Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,
    Make the gruel thick and slab:
    Add thereto a tiger's chaudron,
    For the ingredients of our cauldron.

ALL
    Double, double toil and trouble;
    Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch
    Cool it with a baboon's blood,
    Then the charm is firm and good.

Text Authorship:

  • by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, appears in Macbeth, Act IV, Scene 1

See other settings of this text.

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

  • FRE French (Français) (François-Victor Hugo) , no title

Confirmed with The Arden Edition of the Works of William Shakespeare: Macbeth, Second Series, ed. by Kenneth Muir, London, Methuen Drama, 1951.


Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
Total word count: 403
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