God's Grandeur

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil 
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod? 
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil; 
And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil 
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went 
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs -- 
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent   
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

by Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889) , "God's Grandeur", from Lyra Sacra: A Book of Religious Verse, published 1895

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 , "God's Grandeur", 1999 [soprano and piano], from Four Songs of Gerard Manley Hopkins, no. 2.
by Samuel Barber (1910-1981) , "God's Grandeur" [two a cappella mixed choruses]
by Arthur Edward Drummond Bliss, Sir (1891-1975) , "God's Grandeur", published 1970. [cantata: satb, 2 flutes, 3 trumpets, 4 trombones]
by Newel Kay Brown (1932-) , "God's Grandeur" [baritone, trombone], from Hopkins Set, no. ?
by Arthur M. Campbell , "God's Grandeur" [high voice, piano], from God's Grandeur
by Peter Dickinson (1934-) , "God's Grandeur", 1960-4 [soprano, baritone, satb, organ], from Four Gerard Manley Hopkins Poems
by James Douglas (1932-) , "God's Grandeur", 1966 [medium voice and violoncello], from Light Shining Out of Darkness, no. ?
by Kenneth Leighton (1929-1988) , "God's Grandeur", published 1959. [motet: satb a cappella]
by Ellen Mandel , "God's Grandeur"
by Robert Manno (1944-) , "God's Grandeur" [satb chorus]
by David W. Maves (1937-) , "God's Grandeur", 1968. [satb and orchestra or piano]
by Ernesto P. Pellegrini (1932-) , "God's Grandeur", 1967. [satb a cappella]
by Malcolm Perry , "God's Grandeur", published 1964. [voices (ss) and piano]
by Jason Rico (1978-) , "God's Grandeur" [voice, piano]
by Donna N. Robertson (1935-) , "God's Grandeur", 1969 [choral suite: satb a cappella], from Five Odes to God in Nature on Poems by Gerard Manley Hopkins
by Edmund Duncan Rubbra (1901-1986) , "God's Grandeur", published 1965 [suite: satb, strings, harpsichord or satb, piano], from Inscape
by Martin Edward Fallas Shaw (1875-1958) , "God's Grandeur", published 1948. [anthem: satb, strings, drums, organ]
by Arthur Unsworth (1935-) , "Never Spent" [satb and piano]
by Robert E. Ward (1917-) , "God's Grandeur", published 1966 [soprano and orchestra or piano], from Sacred Songs for Pantheists, no. 5.
by Paul William Whear (1925-) , "God's Grandeur", published 1975. [mezzo-soprano and piano]

Added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.

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