LiederNet logo

CONTENTS

×
  • Home | Introduction
  • Composers (20,028)
  • Text Authors (19,311)
  • Go to a Random Text
  • What’s New
  • A Small Tour
  • FAQ & Links
  • Donors
  • DONATE

UTILITIES

  • Search Everything
  • Search by Surname
  • Search by Title or First Line
  • Search by Year
  • Search by Collection

CREDITS

  • Emily Ezust
  • Contributors (1,112)
  • Contact Information
  • Bibliography

  • Copyright Statement
  • Privacy Policy

Follow us on Facebook

×

Attention! Some of this material is not in the public domain.

It is illegal to copy and distribute our copyright-protected material without permission. It is also illegal to reprint copyright texts or translations without the name of the author or translator.

To inquire about permissions and rates, contact Emily Ezust at licenses@email.lieder.example.net

If you wish to reprint translations, please make sure you include the names of the translators in your email. They are below each translation.

Note: You must use the copyright symbol © when you reprint copyright-protected material.

Translation © by Thomas Heck

Když mne stará matka zpívat, zpívat...
Language: Czech (Čeština)  after the Czech (Čeština) 
Our translations:  ENG ENG FIN FRE ITA ITA
Když mne stará matka zpívat, zpívat učívala,
podivno, že často, často slzívala.
A ted' také pláčem snědé líce mučim,
když cigánské děti hrát a zpívat učim!

About the headline (FAQ)

Note: many singable translations rely on the repetition of "zpívat" in the first line. It was not present in the original text.

The text shown is a variant of another text. [ View differences ]
It is based on

  • a text in Czech (Čeština) by Adolf Heyduk (1835 - 1923), appears in Cigánské melodie, no. 22, first published 1859
    • Go to the text page.

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

  • by Karel Bendl (1838 - 1897), "Když mne stará matka", from Cigánské melodie, no. 2 [sung text not yet checked]
  • by Antonín Dvořák (1841 - 1904), "Když mne stará matka zpívat, zpívat učívala", op. 55 no. 4, B. 104 no. 4 (1880), from Cigánské melodie, no. 4, also set in German (Deutsch) [sung text checked 1 time]

Settings in other languages, adaptations, or excerpts:

  • Also set in English, a translation by Natalie Macfarren (1826 - 1916) ; composed by Charles Edward Ives.
      • Go to the text.
  • Also set in German (Deutsch), a translation by Adolf Heyduk (1835 - 1923) , no title ; composed by Antonín Dvořák.
      • Go to the text.

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

  • ENG English (Gayle Royko Heuser) (Anna Majtas Royko) , "When my old mother taught me to sing", copyright © 2004, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • ENG English [singable] (Thomas Heck) , "When my mother taught me to sing", copyright © 2006, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • FIN Finnish (Suomi) (Erkki Pullinen) , copyright © 2011, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • FRE French (Français) (Marc Moreau) , copyright © 2009, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • ITA Italian (Italiano) (Maria Rita De Matteis) , "Quando la mia vecchia madre ancora mi insegnava a cantare", copyright © 2005, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • ITA Italian (Italiano) [singable] (Thomas Heck) , "Quando mia vecchia madre", copyright © 2006, (re)printed on this website with kind permission


Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2004-01-16
Line count: 4
Word count: 26

When my mother taught me to sing
Language: English  after the Czech (Čeština) 
When my mother taught me to sing,
Sometimes there glistened a tear in her eye;
Hers were songs that like a river
caused my heart to quiver!
Now when I teach little voices,
Pass on my mother's choices;
How I tear up when they sing, when they
sing the songs, the songs my mother taught me.

Text Authorship:

  • Singable translation from Czech (Čeština) to English copyright © 2006 by Thomas Heck, (re)printed on this website with kind permission. To reprint and distribute this author's work for concert programs, CD booklets, etc., you may ask the copyright-holder(s) directly or ask us; we are authorized to grant permission on their behalf. Please provide the translator's name when contacting us.
    Contact: licenses@email.lieder.example.net

Based on:

  • a text in Czech (Čeština) by Not Applicable [an adaptation]
    • Go to the text page.

Based on:

  • a text in Czech (Čeština) by Adolf Heyduk (1835 - 1923), appears in Cigánské melodie, no. 22, first published 1859
    • Go to the text page.

 

This text was added to the website: 2006-05-04
Line count: 8
Word count: 56

Gentle Reminder

This website began in 1995 as a personal project by Emily Ezust, who has been working on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has never had any government or institutional funding, so if you found the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!
–Emily Ezust, Founder

Donate

We use cookies for internal analytics and to earn much-needed advertising revenue. (Did you know you can help support us by turning off ad-blockers?) To learn more, see our Privacy Policy. To learn how to opt out of cookies, please visit this site.

I acknowledge the use of cookies

Contact
Copyright
Privacy

Copyright © 2025 The LiederNet Archive

Site redesign by Shawn Thuris