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Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours
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Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours |
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Subject: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 29 May 02 - 01:28 AM Lyr. Add: HOW TEDIOUS AND TASTELESS THE HOURS (Greenfields) His name yields the sweetest perfume, An' richer than music His voice, His presence disperses my gloom An' makes all within me rejoice. I should, was he always so nigh Have nothin' to wish for or fear, No mortal so happy as I, My summer would last all the year. Content with beholdin' his face, My will to his pleasure resigned, No changes of season or place Could make any change in my mind. While blessed with a sense of His love My palace a toy would appear, An' prisons would palaces prove If Jesus lived with me in there. Dear Lord, if indeed I am thine, An' thou art my sun and my song, Say, why do I languish an' pine, An' why are my winters so long? Oh drive them dark clouds from the sky, Thy soul-cheerin' presence restore, Or else take me with Thee on high Where winter and clouds are no more! @religion @hymn
Mrs. Marie Wilbur, Pineville, Missouri, 1927. From Vance Randolph, Ozark Folksongs, vol. 4, pp. 62-63, with music. Univ. Missouri Press, 1980. |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: michaelr Date: 29 May 02 - 01:42 AM yuk |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: KingBrilliant Date: 29 May 02 - 03:40 AM The first version is lovely, but the second seems somehow lacking. Great name for a song though - and a phrase to bear in mind for future use!! KRis |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Mrrzy Date: 29 May 02 - 01:32 PM Beat me to it, MichaelR! |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 29 May 02 - 02:07 PM oo-oo-oo! What a little rewrite could do-oo-oo! |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: GUEST,maryrrf Date: 29 May 02 - 04:33 PM Oh I thought this was a thread about my job. |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: kytrad (Jean Ritchie) Date: 29 May 02 - 04:34 PM But aren't they both the same song? The 'Tedious and tasteless' verse (8 lines) is the first one, and the others follow. Otherwise, where would the title come from, without the first verse? Also, it sets up the winter/summer theme of the song. This was in our hymnbooks when I was a child. Jean |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 29 May 02 - 05:09 PM Kytrad, I guess the singer of the first song either didn't know, or didn't like the first verse. I have reproduced them just as they appear in the books. "Missouri Harmony," in the portion copied in Sandburg's book, has only the first or at most two verses of the songs that are shown. It looks like something abbreviated from other books. |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Uncle Jaque Date: 29 May 02 - 05:17 PM Thanks, Dicho - but those are pretty much the same lyrics attributed to Newton in 1779. The lyrics I have start out with the first verse of your 1808 version ("How tedious and tasteless..."), and the 1927 verses are stuck in the midst of them. Not that these are a bad set of lyrics, mind ye; I just wonder what originaly went with that "Greenfields" tune before Newton got a hold of it. The melody and meter suggest a love song or bitter-sweet ballad somehow, and crys out "(something - something)...Greeeen - Fields", but nowhere does the phrase occur in Newton's verses. It just makes a lot of sense to me that the original song had something to do with "Green Fields" somehow.
While I'm at it; in the collection we have found severeal variations of the tune under various names, such as "Farewell to Green Fields", "Greenfields" as one or two words, etc., not all of them having a lot in common with each other. As has been observed previously; mixing, matching, switching and swapping melodies and lyrics around with gay abandon (remember, that word used to mean something else back then)was commonplace, and the authenticity of about any workable combination is probably about as historically credible as any of them which appear written on the same page in a period book.
Here's another kink in the hose for a Historical Musician (I guess we might be considered an archaic branch of the "Folk Music" genre, although not all of the music we do was or is strictly "Folk", per se.); I have heard variations of common songs that remind me very much of a HARMONY LINE of the root tune. Example; an early version of "John Brown's Body" is distinctly different from the more familiar "Battle Hymn of the Republic" which was supposedly based on the former tune, but when I listen to a Choral presentation of the "Hymn", I could about swear I hear the Baritone singing what sounds a lot like the earlier "John Brown's" lead or Tenor. Might Mrs. Alcott have used one of the harmony lines of "Brown's" on which to base her monumental "Battle Hymn"... or was it just another "version" of the same old song, only really just another one of the 4 vocal parts in which most of the music of the day was written and performed? In order to have an old song or Hymn come out sounding "right", I usually (not always) can't just get away with singing the Tenor line all the way through, as conventional musical wisdom suggests; Instead I frequently "pick" notes, groups, or progressions out of the other 3 lines as well. I think that Soloists of the period routinely "distilled" a part song down like this, and writers probably broke a simple folk tune they'd collected in a local Pub or cotton field somewhere up into harmony parts by sharing or distributing the root melody around throughout all 4 parts, with the majority or nucleus of the air generally, but not exclusively, settling around the Tenor line. I have observed that the melody of one of these old songs "...skips around the harmony parts like St. Elmo's fire through the rigging of a clipper ship in a thunderstorm". Whether my theory holds water in academic circles or not may be up for debate - but I use it in my arrangements and interpretations of archaic period peices, and will continue to do so, as I think that the resulting melodies seem much more "natural" and resolved somehow.
And yes, Dicho; I'll PM the E-dress, and would love to keep in touch with fellow affectionados of the 18th & 19th Century Music of History - Sacred and Secular. In Remembrance of Them; "Uncle Jaque", Yarmouth Maine, USA 3rd Maine Infantry Regimental Field Music |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 29 May 02 - 06:18 PM Uncle Jaque, the tune to "How tedious" is the beautiful "Mer Hahn en Neue Oberkeet," by none other than Johann Sebastien Bach, also called "The Peasant Cantata" (212). This church cantata is called "Boisterous" in the Penguin Guide to Compact Discs (a weighty compendium of the better classical cds). This may be a folk tune that Bach borrowed and embroidered, but I don't know of antecedents. A student of Bach's vocal music might have an answer. |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Burke Date: 30 May 02 - 05:37 PM Uncle Jacque, the fact that Newton wrote the words tells us nothing about the music he used with them. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen anything discussing the tunes he used when first introducing these various words to his congregation. About all you can be sure of is that he'd use a tune they already knew & introduce words that fit is sermon topic. You can find his original words at CCEL. This same tune & words can be found in Methodist Hymnals through the early 20th century. The tune name is different, but I'm pretty sure the current hymnal still has the tune but with different words. Books like Missouri Harmony are well known for using folk tunes as the basis of the hymn tunes. I've always assumed it was a dance tune, just because it feels that way to me. Here's the version from the Southern Harmony. The tenor (melody) and treble parts are the same as those in the Sacred Harp. I don't know about the counter & bass. A very common practice in these tunes is to have the tenor & treble lines sung by both men & women. These parts frequently cross. Just about everyone I know who has learned listening to a recording comes up with a tune that's a composite of the 2 parts. Even without a recording, I try to learn both treble & tenor parts & will frequently mix them up in my mind. So this type of thing could easily give rise to a 3rd tune. Most of these old books had harmony parts that were in themselves pretty melodic. I think all 3 top lines of Southern Harmony's Green Fields look pretty melodic. I can imagine someone knowing the Harmony part for whatever reason & later using it as the tune for another song.
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 30 May 02 - 06:51 PM As I stated previously, the Cyberhymnal is pretty clear on the history of this hymn: How Tedious (Midi provided of Bach's melody). The hymn was published in "Olney Hymns," London, W. Oliver, 1779. It was set, by Lewis Edson, 1782, in the "Choristers Companion," New Haven, CT, 1782, to the music of the section called "Greenfields" (applied by later writers, not Bach) of Cantata 212, "Mir Hahn en Neue Oberkeet," (commonly called "The Peasant Cantata") composed by Johann Sebastian Bach. The questions remaining are: 1. Did Bach borrow and rearrange folk or other music for his cantata? 2. I don't believe Newton is cited clearly as the author of the lyrics of "How Tedious...." in "Olney Hymns." I will attempt to get a translation of Bach's Cantata 212 (which is a church choral work as well, but structured, much longer, and "boisterous" according to some reviewers. |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 30 May 02 - 06:56 PM Cyberhymnal: http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/h/t/htedious.htm. Having trouble raising Cyberhymnal at the moment. How Tedious |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Burke Date: 31 May 02 - 06:18 PM Dicho, you had not earlier mentioned Cyberhymnal as your source. The midi sounds like an arrangement of Edson's arrangement. I don't see anything to indicate it's directly from Bach's supposed orginal. Cyberhymnal does not cite sources & I have found it unreliable enough on hymns I do know that I'd want to be able to verify it's sources. Is anyone who knows "How Tedious" actually familiar with this Bach Cantata that is supposed to be the original? How close are they, really. OTOH lots of "Bach" Chorales are actually arrangements of hymns with known composers so his Cantata could certainly be an arrangement of an existing tune. My question is would a rural American composer like Edson really know Bach's music? Edson himself wrote 2 of the all time great fuging tunes: Lenox & Bridgewater. Hmm, I think it's time to go solicit information from my hymn guru. 2. William Cowper & John Newton wrote the hymns in the Olney hymn book. While I don't remember which it was, the hymns by one were indicated while the rest were unmarked. Most were by Newton, but 68 were by Cowper, so I suspect it's the Cowper hymns that were marked. The edition of Olney Hymns used by CCEL apparently added the attributions to every hymn. That's probably as close to clear information as to source as you're likely to get. The 68 by Cowper were also included in his Complete Poetical Works & can act as a cross check with the full text of Olney. "How tedious" is not there.
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Burke Date: 31 May 02 - 07:07 PM Seems there's a German translation of this. Found it by a Google search HERE It begins:
"Wie lange und schwer wird die zeit That Methodist (also Presbyterian) title for the hymn is Contrast.
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 31 May 02 - 07:45 PM Captured by the Indians? |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Uncle Jaque Date: 31 May 02 - 10:48 PM Dicho: I'll try to E-Mail/Attach some scannings of various versions of "greenfields"; see if you can see any relationship between them! One is from the Boston Academy School of Music text, 1835, and another two are from the Southern Harmony; one 1853 edition and one 1857 (shape note). I wish we had some way of posting graphics here on a thread for all to see. It seems as though those pre-Newton folk lyrics are still eluding us; I hope that they are not forever lost to posterity (as all too many of them are). |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 01 Jun 02 - 12:34 AM I have asked a Bach scholar and musician relation of mine to compare Mer Hahn En Neue Oberkeet with the melody used in the hymn, and to find out the source of Bach's melody if possible. I hope that he will do it if he isn't on tour somewhere. Bach's music is pretty well documented in his notebooks, and the sources of most of his arranged melodies are known, but a music library specializing in the period would have to be consulted. There is a song known as "Farewell, ye green fields and groves," which possibly could be the melody Bach arranged for part of his Cantata 212. I have never heard it. If the title is not a translation, one of our UK friends might know of it. "The Music of the New American Nation, Vol. 3, Sacred Music from 1780-1820, New York Composers, Collected Works of Lewis Edson, Lewis Edson Jr. and Nathaniel Billings" ed. by Karl Kroeger, may have information. |
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Subject: RE: Lyr Add: How Tedious and Tasteless the Hours From: GUEST,Burke Date: 02 Jun 02 - 07:29 PM I somewhat belatedly realized there was a question in an earlier thread that started all this. I'd like to make a plug for singing the Newton words, especially if you are doing 19th cent. re-enactments. This type of lyric really is in disfavor but I have loved this hymn - words and tune- for many years. They really do speak the way I sometimes feel, but am not really allowed to say in a lot of current religious settings. The 1st verse may sound morose, but the tune itself is really uplifting & somewhere in the middle of singing it- No mortal is so happy as I, My summer does feel as if it would last all the year. Having checked with some hymn mavens I've discovered some more details. Edson has nothing to do with the Green Fields/Tedious & tasteless version. He did write a completely different fuging tune called Greenfield that can be found in the Southern Harmony p. 121 or online For the secular version of Green Fields look for an 18c. English song beginning "Farewell, ye green fields and sweet groves." Another Newton hymn that works well with this tune is When Joseph his brethren beheld. I've had 2 people tell me that the Bach Peasant Cantata does have a melody related to Green Fields. |
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