The splendour falls | The splendour falls on castle walls

The splendour falls on castle walls

Language: English

Our translations: CAT FRE NYN SPA

The splendour falls on castle walls
And snowy summits old in story:
The long light shakes across the lakes,
And the wild cataract leaps in glory:
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O hark, O hear how thin and clear,
And thinner, clearer, farther going!
O sweet and far from cliff and scar
The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!
Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying:
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O love, they die in yon rich sky,
They faint on hill or field or river:
Our echoes roll from soul to soul
And grow for ever and for ever.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
And answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

Available sung texts: ← What is this?

• B. Britten • F. Delius • G. Holst

F. Delius sets stanzas 1-2

About the headline (FAQ)

View text with all available footnotes

Text Authorship:

by Alfred Tennyson, Lord (1809 - 1892), no title, appears in The Princess, first published 1850 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

by Arnold Edward Trevor Bax, Sir (1883 - 1953), "The splendour falls", 1917, orchestrated 1934 [ voice and piano or orchestra ], from Three Songs for Soprano and Orchestra, no. 3 [sung text not yet checked]
by (Edward) Benjamin Britten (1913 - 1976), "Nocturne", op. 31 no. 2 (1943), published 1944, first performed 1943 [ tenor, horn, and strings or piano ], from Serenade for tenor, horn and strings, no. 2, London : Boosey & Hawkes [sung text checked 1 time]
by Benjamin Burrows (1891 - 1966), "The splendour falls", c1912, published 1917 [ voice and piano ], from Three Songs, no. 1 [sung text not yet checked]
by Frederick Delius (1862 - 1934), "The splendour falls on castle walls", stanzas 1-2 [ SATB chorus ] [sung text checked 1 time]
by Malcolm Forsyth (b. 1936), "Blow, bugle, blow", 2000, first performed 2000 [ SATB chorus and brass ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Cecil Armstrong Gibbs (1889 - 1960), "The splendour falls", 1943, published 1944 [ voice and piano ] [sung text checked 1 time]
by Robert Goldbeck (1839 - 1908), "The splendour falls on castle walls ", 1866 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Gustav Holst (1874 - 1934), "The splendour falls", op. 20a no. 2, H. 80 no. 2 [ chorus ], from Songs from The Princess, no. 2 [sung text checked 1 time]
by Dorothy Pilling (1910 - 1998), "The splendour falls" [ voice and piano ], confirmed with a score [sung text checked 1 time]
by John Theodore Livingston Raynor (1909 - 1970), "Blow, bugle, blow", op. 68 (1945) [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872 - 1958), "The splendour falls", c1905, published 1905 [ voice and piano ], first published in the May 1905 Vocalist, and later reissued in 1914 [sung text not yet checked]
by Richard Henry Walthew (1872 - 1951), "The splendour falls" [sung text not yet checked]
by Charles Wood (1866 - 1926), "The splendour falls", published 1927 [ high voice and piano ], from Five Songs for High Voice, no. 1, London: Boosey & Hawkes [sung text not yet checked]

Settings in other languages, adaptations, or excerpts:

Also set in German (Deutsch), a translation by Adolf Strodtmann (1829 - 1879) , no title, appears in Lieder- und Balladenbuch amerikanischer und englischer Dichter der Gegenwart, in Lieder aus "Die Prinzessin", no. 5, first published 1862 ; composed by Heinrich Zöllner.
- Go to the text.

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

SPA Spanish (Español) (Pablo Sabat) , "Nocturno"

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 18
Word count: 127