When I started this project, I would not have imagined Swinburne’s languid ‘The Garden of Proserpine’ from Poems and Ballads, First Series (1866) ever inspiring popular music, and certainly not the tone of this piece by Charles Paston-Cooper (1867-1941). Weary… Read More ›
music
‘East to West’ by Charles Villiers Stanford (1893)
By far the most complex recreation I’ve attempted, this is a section of a setting by Charles Villiers Stanford (1852-1924) of Swinburne’s ‘East to West’. The lyrics were commissioned by Stanford for the ‘Chicago World’s Fair’ or the ‘Chicago Columbian… Read More ›
‘The Hounds of Spring’
Muriel Elliot’s setting of Swinburne’s ‘When the Hounds of Spring’ from his Greek tragedy Atalanta in Calydon (1865), must have been hugely dramatic in performance, and not least at its premiere in the extraordinary venue of the Crystal Palace in 1906. The… Read More ›
My Love, Mine Own, 1880
While I appear to have broken my rule about only including music set to Swinburne lyrics, this really is a special case. The lyrics were clearly inspired by Swinburne, and – as I can find no clue as to where they have… Read More ›
Félise, 1878
This strange and slightly drunk waltz by Theophilus Marzials feels apt for the Swinburne poem from which he took the words – ‘Félise’, from Poems and Ballads, First Series (1866). It’s a poem about the ending of an affair, though… Read More ›
Rondel – Kissing her Hair
This was the first piece of music to be inspired by one of Swinburne’s poems. From 1867, Walter Maynard’s Kissing Her Hair takes its name from the first line of Swinburne’s ‘Rondel‘, from Poems and Ballads (1866). Maynard was the pseudonym of Thomas W. Beale (1828-1894), a… Read More ›
Ask Nothing More
Ask Nothing More, by the unconventional Theophilus Marzials (1850-1920), was a hugely successful song of the 1880s. The lyrics were taken from Swinburne’s ‘The Oblation‘ (Songs Before Sunrise, 1871). Marzials was also a poet, and wrote what has often been claimed as the… Read More ›
Atalanta in Calydon
This is the overture to the 1906 production of Swinburne’s play Atalanta in Calydon (1865), composed by Muriel Elliot, who published the full score in 1912. Originally performed at the Crystal Palace in South London and the (since demolished) Scala Theatre, it… Read More ›
Love Laid His Sleepless Head
Composed by Arthur Sullivan (1842-1900) to lyrics commissioned from A. C. Swinburne, for John Hollingshead’s 1874 production of ‘The Merry Wives of Windsor’ at the Gaiety Theatre London. It was sung by the character Anne Page (and a chorus of… Read More ›
The Triumph of Time
Composed by Adela Maddison (a.k.a. Mrs Brunning Maddison, 1862-1929), from Twelve Songs (Op. 9, No. 3), 1895, London: Metzler & Co. This is a really terrific adaption, translation, or perhaps transmutation of Swinburne’s text. Moody, elemental, maybe it’s music that’s playing poetic and… Read More ›
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