The Muses of W.B. Yeats | Irish America. By James Flannery, ContributorDecember / January 2011 The women who influenced the poetry of W.B. Yeats. It will come as no surprise to admirers of W.B. Yeats that this greatest of modern poets was a celebrant of the art of love from the beginning to the end of his long and immensely productive career. As Hassett explains, from the outset of his career Yeats was convinced that art at its most sublime springs from the influx of a supernal form of knowledge far beyond the realm of ordinary discourse.
In the courtly love tradition the Muses were deliberately wooed by the poet to extend his spiritual and aesthetic capacities to their furthest possible reaches. Has there ever been a more ardent, exalted, emotionally expressive or tortured tribute to a real life Muse than that contained in the poems and plays of Yeats inspired by Maud? In a letter to Yeats, Iseult described herself as both his “pupil” and his “teacher.” Joseph Hassett’s W.B. W.B. Leave a Reply. XII Social Customs—Continued. The Arts of Pleasure—Vocal and Instrumental Music. Page 135 The Maori love of song—Intoning a common practice—Appreciation of euphony and rhythm—Rhyme unknown—Quarter tones—Maori singing monotonous to our ears—The universal hianga—Songs difficult to translate—Euphony gained by word mutilation—Laments—Songs composed for trivial reasons—Lament for a pig—Songs introduced into speeches—History taught in songs—Different classes of songs—Subjects of songs—Musical Instruments—The simpler European instruments alone appeal to Maori—The pu-torino—Flutes—The koauau—A wife won by flute playing—The nose flute—Unmusical instruments—The pu-kaea or trumpet—A gourd instrument—The shell trumpet—The bullroarer—Its ceremonial use—The pahu or gong—Tree gongs—The true drum unknown—The pakuru—The roria—The ku—A first attempt at a string instrument.
Although singing forms no important element in our lives, such a remark cannot be employed in connection with the Maori folk. For these people made much use of song in order to express their feelings and thoughts. Oxford DNB. Armstrong, Sir Thomas Henry Wait (1898–1994), organist and college administrator, was born on 15 June 1898 at Peterborough, the only son of Amos Ebenezer Armstrong (1878–1950), an organist and choirmaster, and his wife, Elizabeth Annie West, née Handford (1880–1939), a former headmistress.
He had two younger sisters, Biddy and Ursula. His father was for fifty years a leading figure in Peterborough's musical life: music master at the King's School, organist and choirmaster at St Augustine's, Woodston, and conductor of the operatic society, orchestral society, and choral union. Armstrong won a place in the Chapel Royal choir at St James's in 1907, aged nine; he wore the traditional gold and scarlet Tudor uniform. In 1910 he sang the solo in Mendelssohn's ‘Hear my prayer’ each evening as the body of Edward VII lay in state at Buckingham Palace, including, by special request of Queen Alexandra, the final part, ‘O!
For the wings of a dove’. Richard Stoker Sources R. Archives priv. coll. J. Reviews of Pagan Music CDs. Reverberating Song in Shakespeare and Milton: Language, Memory, and Musical ... - Erin Minear. The pathvvay to musicke [electronic resource] : contayning sundrie familiar and easie rules for the ... Descants for Hymns in THE CHRISTIAN LIFE HYMNAL | HymnWyse. Nothing makes a hymn soar, in my estimation, like a well-written, and beautifully sung descant. If you’re not familiar with what a descant is, it is a counter melody, typically sung by the sopranos (trebles in English Cathedrals), and sometimes joined by the tenors, on the last verse of a hymn (or refrain) to give the hymn a lift. I use them frequently in my own worship planning – virtually every Easter Sunday, the sopranos soar on the descant on the last verse of “Christ the Lord Is Risen Today Alleluia!” What better time to “soar” than on that great lyric “Soar we now where Christ has led, Alleluia!”
Perhaps the most famous descant is verse 6 of “O Come, All Ye Faithful” “Sing, choirs of angels…” from the David Wilcocks arrangement (Carols for Choirs/Oxford) heard so often on the Lessons & Carols from Kings College Christmas Eve. Here is an example of a descant: YOUTUBE: Sing, Choirs of Angels Descant • Sing on “ahh” rather than lyrics. I will begin posting a descant each week. The Project Gutenberg eBook of How Music Developed, by W. J. Henderson. Descant. Descant or discantus can refer to several different things in music, depending on the period in question; etymologically, the word means a voice (cantus) above or removed from others. A discant (occasionally, particularly later, written descant) is a form of medieval music in which one singer sang a fixed melody, and others accompanied with improvisations. The word in this sense comes from the term discantus supra librum (descant "above the book"), and is a form of Gregorian chant in which only the melody is notated but an improvised polyphony is understood.
The discantus supra librum had specific rules governing the improvisation of the additional voices. Descants in hymns[edit] Hymn tune descants are counter-melodies, generally at a higher pitch than the main melody. Further reading[edit] Clark Kimberling, "Hymn Tune Descants, Part 1: 1915–1934", The Hymn 54 (no. 3) July 2003, pages 20–27. External links[edit] Selection of hymnal descants.