When to the sessions of sweet silent...

When to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste:
Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow,
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,
And weep afresh love's long since cancell'd woe,
And moan the expense of many a vanish'd sight:
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
The sad account of fore-bemoaned moan,
Which I new pay as if not paid before.
  But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,
  All losses are restored and sorrows end.

by William Shakespeare (1564-1616) , no title, from Sonnets, no. 30

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

by Gary Bachlund , "Sonnet XXX - "When to the sessions of sweet silent thought"", 2002 [high or medium voice and piano], from Five Sonnets, no. 4.
by Leslie Crabtree (1941-) , "Sonnet XXX"
by David Leo Diamond (1915-2005) , "When to the sessions of sweet silent thought", from We Two, no. 9.
by Alan Hovhaness (1911-2000) , no title, op. 31 no. 2 (1939), published 1942? [voice and piano], from 2 Shakespeare Sonnets, no. 2.
by Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry (1848-1918) , "When to the sessions of sweet silent thought", 1873-82, published 1887 [voice and piano], from Four Sonnets of Shakespeare, no. 4.
by Richard Simpson (-1876) , "Sonnet XXX", 1864-5. [medium voice and piano]

by Dmitry Borisovich Kabalevsky (1904-1987) , "Kogda na sud bezmolvnykh, tajnykh dum", op. 52 no. 4 (1953-5), from Desjat' sonetov Shekspira, no. 4.

by Elliot Weisgarber (1919-2001) , "Sonnet I", 1971 [soprano, flute, oboe, harpsichord, violin, viola, and violoncello], from Of Love and Time (Ren-ai To Toki Ni Tsuite), no. 1.

ITA Italian (Ferdinando Albeggiani)

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