Text for Sea Pictures

Sea Slumber Song
Text by Roden Berkeley Wriothesley Noel (1834-1894)


Sea-birds are asleep,
The world forgets to weep,
Sea murmurs her soft slumber-song
On the shadowy sand
Of this elfin land;

I, the Mother mild,
Hush thee, oh my child,
Forget the voices wild!
Hush thee, oh my child,
Hush thee.

Isles in elfin light
Dream, the rocks and caves,
Lulled by whispering waves,
Veil their marbles
Veil their marbles bright.
Foam glimmers faintly white
faintly white
Upon the shelly sand
Of this elfin land;

Sea-sound, like violins,
To slumber woos and wins,
I murmur my soft slumber-song,
my slumber song
Leave woes, and wails, and sins.

Ocean's shadowy night
Breathes good night,
Good night...
Leave woes, and wails, and sins.
Good night...Good night...
Good night...

Good night...

Good night... Good night.


2. In Heaven (Capri)
Text by Caroline Alice Elgar (1848-1920)


Closely let me hold thy hand,
Storms are sweeping sea and land;
Love alone will stand.

Closely cling, for waves beat fast,
Foam-flakes cloud the hurrying blast;
Love alone will last.

Kiss my lips, and softly say:
Joy, sea-swept, may fade to-day;
Love alone will stay.


3. Sabbath Morning at Sea
Text by Elizabeth Barret Browning (1806-1861)


The ship went on with solemn face;
To meet the darkness on the deep,
The solemn ship went onward.
I bowed down weary in the place;
for parting tears and present sleep
Had weighed mine eyelids downward.

The new sight, the new wondrous sight!
The waters around me, turbulent,
The skies, impassive o'er me,
Calm in a moonless, sunless light,
As glorified by even the intent
Of holding the day glory!

Love me, sweet friends, this sabbath day.
The sea sings round me while ye roll afar
The hymn, unaltered,
And kneel, where once I knelt to pray,
And bless me deeper in your soul
Because your voice has faltered.

And though this sabbath comes to me
Without the stolèd minister,
And chanting congregation,
God's Spirit shall give comfort.
He who brooded soft on waters drear,
Creator on creation.

He shall assist me to look higher,
He shall assist me to look higher,
Where keep the saints, with harp and song,
An endless endless sabbath morning,
An endless sabbath morning,
And that sea commixed with fire,
And that sea commixed with fire,
Oft drop their eyelids raised too long
To the full Godhead's burning.
The full Godhead's burning.


4. Where Corals Lie
Text by Richard Garnett (1835-1906)


The deeps have music soft and low
When winds awake the airy spry,
It lures me, lures me on to go
And see the land where corals lie.
The land, the land where corals lie.

By mount and steed, by lawn and rill,
When night is deep, and moon is high,
That music seeks and finds me still,
And tells me where the corals lie.
And tells me where the corals lie.

Yes, press my eyelids close, 'tis well,
Yes, press my eyelids close, 'tis well,
But far the rapid fancies fly
The rolling worlds of wave and shell,
And all the lands where corals lie.

Thy lips are like a sunset glow,
Thy smile is like a morning sky,
Yet leave me, leave me, let me go
And see the land where corals lie.
The land, the land where corals lie.


5. The Swimmer
Text by Adam Lindsay Gordon (1833-1870)


With short, sharp violent lights made vivid,
To southward far as the sight can roam,
Only the swirl of the surges livid,
The sees that climb and the surfs that comb.

Only the crag and the cliff to nor'ward,
And the rocks receding, and reefs flung forward,
Waifs wreck'd seaward and wasted shoreward,
On shallows sheeted with flaming foam.

A grim, gray coast and a seaboard ghastly,
And shores tro seldom by feet of men -
Where the batter'd hull and the broken mast lie,
They have lain embedded these long years ten.

Love! Love! when we wandered here together,
Hand in hand! Hand in hand through the sparkling weather,
From the heights and hollows of fern and heather,

God surely loved us a little then.

The skies were fairer and shores were firmer -
The blue sea over the bright sand roll'd;
Babble and prattle, and ripple and murmur,
Sheen of silver and glamour of gold.
Sheen of silver and glamour of gold.

So, girl with tempest and wing'd with thunder
And clad with lightning and shod with sleet,
And strong winds treading the swift waves under
The flying rollers with frothy feet.

One gleam like a bloodshot sword-blade swims on
The sky line, staining the green gulf crimson,
A death-stroke fiercely dealt by a dim sun
That strikes through his stormy winding sheet.

O brave white horses! you gather and gallop,
The storm sprite loosens the gusty rains;
O brave white horses! you gather and gallop,
The storm sprite loosens the gusty rains;

Now the stoutest ship were the frailest shallop
In your hollow backs, on your high-arched manes.
I would ride as never a man has ridden
In your sleepy, swirling surges hidden;

I would ride as never a man has ridden
To gulfs foreshadow'd through strifes forbidden,
Where no light wearies and no love wanes.
Where no love wanes.

演奏巴赫这六首无伴奏组曲，最富于启示性的也是最早的权威的版本，当然是卡萨尔斯3O年代后期的这个录音。这些组曲曾被相当多的音乐家演绎，卡萨尔斯的浑厚有力，富尼埃的舒展如歌，罗斯特罗波维奇轻盈而显得匆忙，初听上去简直就象不同的作品。卡萨尔斯的录于30年代(36年至39年)大师刚过了60岁之后。我一向怀疑四十年代和之前的所谓历史录音，认为无论上一代大师们的演奏如何精彩，但毕竟录音技术有限，很难保留真实的演奏的音响。如果把罗斯特罗波维奇的演奏看作一幅色彩斑谰的油画。卡萨尔斯就是早先古朴的铜版画，线条坚实挺劲，具有难以想象的力度，像是凸现于整个画面之上种线条一旦在你面前显出须眉皆动而欲飞舞之状时，真是要令人心魄俱与的。巴赫的精神，在这里始终是回荡在音乐的空间之中，而不是从中沁出来。
卡萨尔斯手指的力量惊人，不知是否得益于他边拉琴边抽雪茄的缘故，大提琴像是他的一件玩具。长期来，卡萨尔斯的这套录音已被公认为为这个作品的里程碑式的权威演绎。他的这一成就来自他对这部巴赫巨着的长达几十年的精心研读和作品精髓的发掘。据他自述，从13岁时他在一家旧书店发现这套作品的乐谱开始，他在这套作品上每天研读练功12年，到25岁才鼓起勇气第一次公开演奏其中的一部全曲。又过了35年，才在录音公司的长期不断催促之下答应录制这套作品，使我们今日能得以领略一代大师对这套作品的解读。