Sir Arnold Edward Trevor Bax: Five Irish Songs (The Lied and Art Song Texts Page: Texts and Translations to Lieder, mélodies, canzoni, and other classical vocal music)


Odalisques, odalisques, 
Treading the pavement 
With feet pomegranate-stained: 
We bartered for, bought you 
Back in the years 
Ah, then we knew you, 
Odalisques, odalisques, 
Treading the pavement 
With feet pomegranate-stained! 

Queens of the air 
Aithra, lole, 
Eos and Auge, 
Taking new beauty 
From the sun's evening brightness, 
Gyring in light 
As nymphs play in waters 
Aithra, lole, 
Eos and Auge! 
Then down on our doorsteps, 
Gretchen and Dora. . . .

2. As I came over the grey, grey hills

Language: English

Authorship

Joseph Campbell (1881-1944)

The Gilly of Christ

See other settings of this text


As I came over the grey, grey hills
 . . . . . . . . . .

[--- The rest of this text is not
currently in the database but will be
added as soon as we obtain it. ---]

3. I heard a piper piping

Language: English

Authorship

Joseph Campbell (1881-1944)

The Mountainy Singer

See other settings of this text


I heard a piper piping
 . . . . . . . . . .

[--- The rest of this text is not
currently in the database but will be
added as soon as we obtain it. ---]

4. Across the door

Language: English

Authorship

Padraic Colum (1881-1972)

Wild Earth


The fiddles were playing and playing, 
The couples were out on the floor; 
From converse and dancing he drew me, 
And across the door. 

Ah! strange were the dim, wide meadows, 
And strange was the cloud-strewn sky, 
And strange in the meadows the corncrakes, 
And they making cry! 

The hawthorn bloom was by us, 
Around us the breath of the south 
White hawthorn, strange in the night-time 
His kiss on my mouth!

5. Beg-Innish

Language: English

Authorship

John Millington Synge (1871-1909)

Poems by J. M. Synge


Bring Kateen-beug and Maurya Jude
To dance in Beg-Innish,
And when the lads (they're in Dunquin)
Have sold their crabs and fish,
Wave fawny shawls and call them in,
And call the little girls who spin,
And seven weavers from Dunquin,
To dance in Beg-Innish.
  
I'll play you jigs, and Maurice Kean,
Where nets are laid to dry,
I've silken strings would draw a dance
From girls are lame or shy;
Four strings I've brought from Spain and France
To make your long men skip and prance,
Till stars look out to see the dance 
Where nets are laid to dry.
  
We'll have no priest or peeler in
To dance in Beg-Innish;
But we'll have drink from M'riarty Jim
Rowed round while gannets fish,
A keg with porter to the brim,
That every lad may have his whim,
Till we up sails with M'riarty Jim
And sail from Ben-Innish.