Songs
Roger Quilter's output of songs, more than one hundred in total, added to the canon of English art song that is still sung today. Among the most popular are "Love's Philosophy", "Come Away Death", "Weep You No More", "By the Sea", and his setting of "O Mistress Mine". Quilter's setting of verses from the Tennyson poem "Now Sleeps the Crimson Petal" is one of his earliest songs but is nonetheless characteristic of the later, mature style.
In November 1936, Quilter's opera Julia was presented at Covent Garden by the British Music Drama Opera Company under the direction of Vladimir Rosing.
Quilter enjoyed a fruitful collaboration with the tenor Gervase Elwes until the latter's death in 1921. As a homosexual, he found it difficult to cope with some of the pressures which he felt were imposed upon him, and eventually deteriorated into mental illness after the loss of his nephew during the Second World War.
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Famous quotes containing the word songs:
“Dylan is to me the perfect symbol of the anti-artist in our society. He is against everything—the last resort of someone who doesn’t really want to change the world.... Dylan’s songs accept the world as it is.”
—Ewan MacColl (1915–1989)
“The militancy of men, through all the centuries, has drenched the world with blood, and for these deeds of horror and destruction men have been rewarded with monuments, with great songs and epics. The militancy of women has harmed no human life save the lives of those who fought the battle of righteousness. Time alone will reveal what reward will be allotted to women.”
—Emmeline Pankhurst (1858–1928)
“O past! O happy life! O songs of joy!
In the air, in the woods, over fields,
Loved! loved! loved! loved! loved!
But my mate no more, no more with me!
We two together no more.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)