Flow My Tears
Flow My Tears was originally a lute song written by the Elizabethan composer John Dowland , which also found its way into the English vocabulary as a poem.
Before becoming the most famous of Dowland's works, this lute song was originally published as an instrumental work under the title Lachrimae Pavane in 1596 .
It is believed that Dowland himself wrote the text. The melancholy that bears the lyrics was in vogue in Elizabethan times, and so the play became one of the most famous works in the English language.
About the song
The song consists of three short musical sections (A, B, C), each of which is repeated immediately:
AA (verses 1 and 2), BB (verses 3 and 4), CC (verse 5 is repeated on the same melody). The music composed by Dowland increases the mood of sadness through its slow tempo, the use of the minor key and its descending four-note melody pattern, which is supposed to represent falling tears. This descending pattern also shapes the entire song through changes in pitch and rhythm.
The text expresses the intense melancholy of a person whose happiness has been abruptly destroyed and who no longer wants to be rescued from this dark despair, which conjures up ideas of darkness and neglect.
The lyrics begin with a call to mourn and cry, a visual language that is very much appreciated by the courtly audience. However, it was not a song that was aimed at people who really grieved, but rather a fashionable accessory, which, however, does not weaken its simple and powerful imagery.
The poem
text | translation |
---|---|
Flow, my tears, fall from your springs! |
Flow, my tears, flow from your sources, |
Down vain lights, shine you no more! |
Go out, you dim lights, shine no more! |
Never may my woes be relieved, |
My suffering can never be alleviated |
From the highest spire of contentment |
From the highest peak of contentment |
Hark! you shadows that in darkness dwell, |
Listen, you shadows who dwell in the dark, |
reception
The piece was enthusiastically received and adapted by Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck , Melchior Schildt and William Randall , as well as partly used by the German band Subway to Sally in the song Syrah. The band Qntal has released a version of "Flow My Tears" on their album "Qntal IV - Ozymandias".
literature
- Keith Roberts: Pavane or the momentous assassination of Elizabeth I . Heyne, Munich 1977, ISBN 3-453-06224-8 .
Web links
- Video of "Flow my Tears" sung by Valeria Mignaco, soprano & Alfonso Marin, lute
- Sheet music for "Flow my Tears"
- "Flow my Tears" sung by counter tenor Andreas Scholl
Individual evidence
- ^ Roger Kamien: Music: An Appreciation , Brief: "Flow My Tears expresses the intense melancholy of someone whose happiness has been abruptly shattered." ( Online , seen December 15, 2015).
- ^ Qntal IV. Ozymandias / Qntal. In: http://www.sonusantiqva.org . Retrieved May 17, 2020 .